Silicon dioxide insulating films for integrated circuits are provided with enhanced electronic properties, including enhanced dielectric break-down of MOS insulating layers and reduced trapping of holes by exposing a metal oxide semiconductor wafer including an exposed silicon dioxide layer, in an ambient of flowing oxygen gas, to heating radiation from a halogen lamp for a duration on the order of 100 seconds to achieve annealing temperature on the order of 1000C. For reduced hole trapping, the ambient gas is oxygen and the annealing temperature is on the order of 1000C for a duration on the order of 100 seconds, depending on the oxide thickness. Nitrogen, occurring at the silicon-silicon dioxide interface as a result of previous processing including a long anneal in nitrogen, increases the improvement of the silicon dioxide by the subsequent rapid thermal annealing in oxygen.