Possibility of the existence of a topological defect in dynamic deformation of the free-standing ultrathin silicon wafer during MeV ion irradiation

We study the ion-irradiation-induced deformation of free-standing ultrathin Si wafers with a thickness of 8 μm. The time-response spectrum of the deformation was measured using a laser displacement meter with a time resolution of 1 ms. The results showed that the deformation appeared during irradiation and disappeared after irradiation. The deformation was composed of a fast deformation with a millisecond time constant and a slow deformation with a second time constant. We performed a model calculation to identify the deformation mechanisms. We found that the fast deformation originated from expansion or shrinkage of crystal lattice caused by beam heating and deduced that the slow deformation resulted from the topological defect formation in Si crystals. The relaxation time of the slow deformation is related to the coordination number of disappeared topological defects. In this experiment, we conclude that the deformation of Si crystals maintains reversible behavior in the formation of topological defects up to the coordination number 5.