The doping dependence of dry thermal oxidation rates in n-type 4H-SiC was investigated. The oxidation was performed in the temperature range 1000C to 1200C for samples with nitrogen doping in the range of 6.5e15/cm3 to 9.3e18/cm3, showing a clear doping dependence. Samples with higher doping concentrations displayed higher oxidation rates. The results were interpreted using a modified Deal-Grove model. Linear and parabolic rate constants and activation energies were extracted. Increasing nitrogen led to an increase in linear rate constant pre-exponential factor from 10-6m/s to 10-2m/s and the parabolic rate constant pre-exponential factor from 10e9m2/s to 10e6m2/s. The increase in linear rate constant was attributed to defects from doping-induced lattice mismatch, which tend to be more reactive than bulk crystal regions. The increase in the diffusion-limited parabolic rate constant was attributed to degradation in oxide quality originating from the doping-induced lattice mismatch. This degradation was confirmed by the observation of a decrease in optical density of the grown oxide films from 1.4 to 1.24. The linear activation energy varied from 1.6eV to 2.8eV, while the parabolic activation energy varied from 2.7eV to 3.3eV, increasing with doping concentration. These increased activation energies were attributed to higher nitrogen content, leading to an increase in effective bond energy stemming from the difference in C-Si (2.82eV) and Si-N (4.26eV) binding energies. This work provides crucial information in the engineering of SiO2 dielectrics for SiC MOS structures, which typically involve regions of very different doping concentrations, and suggests that thermal oxidation at high doping concentrations in SiC may be defect mediated.
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