Molecular dynamics study of velocity distribution and local temperature change during rapid cooling processes in excimer-laser annealed silicon

Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have been performed to investigate velocity distribution of atoms and local temperature changes during rapid cooling processes in excimer-laser annealed Si. The interatomic forces were calculated using the Tersoff potential, and the rapid cooling processes were simulated by determining the atomic movements with a combination of Langevin and Newton equations using a MD cell with the size of 48.9 × 48.9 × 97.8 ų. The local velocity distribution during rapid cooling processes was found to be the Maxwell-Boltzmann type, and the steady-state temperature distribution was obtained within 100 ps.