Abstract
Picosecond ultrasonics is employed to study the titanium silicide formation sequence for evaporated Ti films on silicon substrates annealed at temperatures between 300 and 800 °C. The measurements show significant differences in the ultrasonic echo pattern before and after the structural phases C49 and C54 are formed, thus indicating that picosecond ultrasonics is a sensitive non-destructive probe of silicide formation. The longitudinal sound velocity has been found to be (8.3 ± 0.2) × 105 cm/sec for C49 TiSi2, and about 5% lower for the C54 phase