This symposium attracted 82 papers which were presented orally or as posters. Fourteen invited speakers presented state of the art reviews and aspects of future key topics in this increasingly important area of materials science. The high level of scientific presentation during the conference enhanced the aim of the symposium, which was to stimulate discussion amongst materials scientists, chemists, engineers and physicists with a common interest in this field and to disseminate knowledge of progress.

This volume discusses both the practical and theoretical aspects of energy beam materials processing. It highlights the recent advances in the use of beams and incoherent light sources to enhance or modify chemical processes at solid surfaces. Special attention is given to the latest developments in the use of ion, electron and photon beams, and on laser-assisted process chemistry. Thin film and surface and interface reactions as well as bulk phase transformations are discussed. Practical technological details and the criteria for present and future applications are also reviewed. The papers collected in this volume reflect the continuing strong interest and variety of development in this field.

This text aims at providing a comprehensive and up to date treatment of the new and rapidly expanding field of laser pro cessing of thin films, particularly, though by no means exclu sively, of recent progress in the dielectrics area. The volume covers all the major aspects of laser processing technology in general, from the background and history to its many potential applications, and from the theory to the necessary experimental considerations. It highlights and compares the vast array of processing conditions now available with intense photon beams, as well as the properties of the films and microstructures pro duced. Separate chapters deal with the fundamentals of laser interactions with matter, and with experimental considerations. Detailed consideration is also given to film deposition, nuclea tion and growth, oxidation and annealing, as well as selective and localized. etching and ablation, not only in terms of the various photon-induced processes, but also with respect to traditional as well as other competing new technologies.

Silicon, as an electronic substrate, has sparked a technological revolution that has allowed the realization of very large scale integration (VLSI) of circuits on a chip. These 6 fingernail-sized chips currently carry more than 10 components, consume low power, cost a few dollars, and are capable of performing data processing, numerical computations, and signal conditioning tasks at gigabit-per-second rates. Silicon, as a mechanical substrate, promises to spark another technological revolution that will allow computer chips to come with the eyes, ears, and even hands needed for closed-loop control systems. The silicon VLSI process technology which has been perfected over three decades can now be extended towards the production of novel structures such as epitaxially grown optoelectronic GaAs devices, buried layers for three dimensional integration, micromechanical mechanisms, integrated photonic circuits, and artificial neural networks. This book begins by addressing the processing of electronic and optoelectronic devices produced by using lattice mismatched epitaxial GaAs films on Si. Two viable technologies are considered. In one, silicon is used as a passive substrate in order to take advantage of its favorable properties over bulk GaAs; in the other, GaAs and Si are combined on the same chip in order to develop IC configurations with improved performance and increased levels of integration. The relationships between device operation and substrate quality are discussed in light of potential electronic and optoelectronic applications.

Amorphous silicon PV panel mass production will require to mas ter plasma chemical deposition in terms of large sizes, cost, maintenance and all other problems related to industrialization. Since plasma deposition is a novel technique, the development of all this production related know how involves a considerable technical research effort. The major problems related to the design of a production deposi tion machine are the following - deposition should be uniform on very large area substrate (typical dimension 1 meter) ; - the deposited amorphous silicon should have good electronic properties (density of state of the order or less than 16 3 10 cm /eV) and very low impurities concentrations (for exam ple oxygen atomic concentration should idealy be less than 0. 01 %) ; - the film stress should be limited, the density of ponctual defects (particulates) should remain reasonable (less than 2 per 100 cm ) ; - dopant level control should be stable and efficient ; - silane consumption should remain reasonably efficient - financial cost being important the machine productivity should be high hence deposition rate optimized ; - downtime due to maintenance should be reduced to a minimum. We present here some results on the R&D effort addressed to the above mentioned problems. An original single chamber was designed. This machine will be made available on the market for R&D purposes by a process machine company. Finally the maintenance problem is considered. Plasma cleaning based on a fluorine containing etchant gases is studied and evaluated. 2.