• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.176-181
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• 2012

Due to the high etch rate and low fabrication cost, the wet etching of silicon using KOH etchant is widely used in MEMS fabrication area. However, anisotropic etch characteristic obstruct intuitional mask design and compensation structures are required for mask design level. Therefore, the accurate modeling for various types of silicon surface is essential for fabrication of three-dimensional MEMS structure. In this paper, we modeled KOH etch profile for MEMS based energy harvester using fuzzy logic. Modeling results are compared with experimental results and it is applied to design of compensation structure for MEMS based energy harvester. Through Fuzzy inference approaches, developed model showed good agreement with the experimental results with limited etch rate information.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.24 no.10
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• pp.779-783
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• 2011

The morphology of etch pits in commercial 4H-SiC epi-wafer were investigated by molten-KOH etching. The etching process was optimized in $525{\sim}570^{\circ}C$ at 2~10 min and the novel type of etch pits was revealed. This type of etch pits have been considered as TED (threading edge dislocation) II, its origin and nature, however, are not reported yet. In this work, the morphology and evolution of etch pits during epitaxial growth were analyzed and the different behavior between TED and TEDII was discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.135-139
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• 2014

The hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) grown GaN samples to precisely measure the surface characteristics was applied to a molten KOH/NaOH wet chemical etching. The etching rate by molten KOH/NaOH wet chemical etching method was slower than that by conventional etching methods, such as phosphoric and sulfuric acid etching, which may be due to the formation of insoluble coating layer. Therefore, the molten KOH/NaOH wet chemical etching is a better efficient method for the evaluation of etch pits density. The grown GaN single crystals were characterized by using X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray rocking curve (XRC). The etching characteristics and surface morphologies were studied by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). From etching results, the optimum etching condition that the etch pits were well independently separated in space and clearly showed their shape, was $410^{\circ}C$ and 25 min. The etch pits density obtained by molten KOH/NaOH wet chemical etching under optimum etching condition was around $2.45{\times}10^6cm^{-2}$, which is commercially an available materials.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.08a
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• pp.299.2-299.2
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• 2013

We investigated the potassium remaining on a crystalline silicon solar cell after potassium hydroxide (KOH) etching and its effect on the lifetime of the solar cell. KOH etching is generally used to remove the saw damage caused by cutting a Si ingot; it can also be used to etch the rear side of a textured crystalline silicon solar cell before atomic layer-deposited Al2O3 growth. However, the potassium remaining after KOH etching is known to be detrimental to the efficiency of Si solar cells. In this study, we etched a crystalline silicon solar cell in three ways in order to determine the effect of the potassium remnant on the efficiency of Si solar cells. After KOH etching, KOH and tetramethylammonium hydroxide (TMAH) were used to etch the rear side of a crystalline silicon solar cell. To passivate the rear side, an Al2O3 layer was deposited by atomic layer deposition (ALD). After ALD Al2O3 growth on the KOH-etched Si surface, we measured the lifetime of the solar cell by quasi steady-state photoconductance (QSSPC, Sinton WCT-120) to analyze how effectively the Al2O3 layer passivated the interface of the Al2O3 layer and the Si surface. Secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) was also used to measure how much potassium remained on the surface of the Si wafer and at the interface of the Al2O3 layer and the Si surface after KOH etching and wet cleaning.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2002.11a
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• pp.133-133
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• 2002

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.196-201
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• 2014

We investigated defects and surface polarity in AlN and GaN by using wet chemical etching. Therefore, the effectiveness and reliability of estimating the single crystals by defect selective etching in NaOH/KOH eutectic alloy have been successfully demonstrated. High-quality AlN and GaN single crystals were etched in molten NaOH/KOH eutectic alloy. The etching characteristics and surface morphologies were carried out by scanning electron microscope (SEM) and atomic force microscope (AFM). The etch rates of AlN and GaN surface were calculated by etching depth as a function of etching time. As a result, two-types of etch pits with different sizes were revealed on AlN and GaN surface, respectively. Etching produced hexagonal pits on the metal-face (Al, Ga) (0001) plane, while hexagonal hillocks formed on the N-face. On etching rate calibration, it was found that N-face had approximately 109 and 15 times higher etch rate than the metal-face of AlN and GaN, respectively. The size of etch pits increased with an increase of the etching time and they tend to merge together with a neighbouring etch pits. Also, the chemical mechanism of each etching process was discussed. It was found that hydroxide ion ($OH^-$) and the dangling bond of nitrogen play an important role in the selective etching of the metal-face and N-face.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.65-71
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• 1999

The effects of mask materials and etching solutions on the dimensional accuracy of V-groove were studied for the alignment between optoelectronic devices and optical fibers in optical packaging. PECVD nitride, LPCVD nitride, or thermal oxide($SiO_2$) was used as a mask material. The anisotropic etching solution was KOH(40wt%) or the mixture of KOH and IPA. LPCVB nitride has the best etching selectivity and thermal oxide was etched most rapidly in KOH(40wt%) at $85^{\circ}C$ among the mask materials studied here. The V-groove size enlarged than the designed value. This phenomenon was due to the undercutting benearth the mask layer from the etching toward Si (111) plane. The etch rate of (111) plane wart 0.034 - 0.037 $\mu\textrm{m}$/min in KOH(40wt%). This rate was almost same regardless of mask materials. When IPA added to KOH(40wt%), the etch rate of (100) plane and (111) plane decreased, but etching ratio of (100) to (111) plane increased. Consequently, the undercutting phenomenon due to etching toward (111) plane decreased and the size of V-groove could be controlled more accurately.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2004.11a
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• pp.132-135
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• 2004

현재 사용 되고 있는 Cu CMP slurry에서 pH 적정제의 역할은 slurry의 연마 거동을 결정 하는 중요한 요소이다. 일반적으로 사용 되고 있는 적정제로는 $NH_4OH$, KOH가 있다. 구리 CMP용 슬러리내에서 CMP 공정 중에 과산화수소 $(H_2O_2)$의 영향에 관한 연구는 있으나, 과산화수소의 농도 (vol %) 변화에 따라서 pH적정제가 하는 역할과 반응이 CMP 공정중에 미치는 영향에 관해서 연구된 바 없다. 이 논문에서는 pH 적정제가 과산화수소의 농도에 따라서 산성, 중성, 염기성에서 어떠한 변화를 일으키는지에 관해서 dynamic etch rate과 removal rate을 비교 하였고, static etch rate을 이용하여 Cu 표면이 etching 되는 속도를 비교 하였다. 그 결과, 산성과 중성에서는 $NH_4OH$와 KOH의 경향성은 비슷하였으나, 염기성에서는 KOH를 첨가한 경우 변화가 나타나지 않았다. 따라서, pH가 염기성으로 갈수록 과산화수소의 저 농도에서 $NH_4OH$의 영향이 더 커짐을 알 수 있었다.

• New & Renewable Energy
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.26-31
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• 2009

The surface etching characteristics of single crystalline silicon wafer were investigated using potassium hydroxide (KOH) and tetramethylammonium hydroxide (TMAH). The saw damage layer was removed after 10min by KOH 45wt% solution at $80^{\circ}C$. The wafer etched at high temperature ($90^{\circ}C$) and in low concentration (4wt%) of TMAH solution showed an increased etch rate of silicon wafer and wavy patterns on the surface. Especially, pyramidal textures were formed in 4wt% TMAH solution without alcohol additives.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1996.07c
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• pp.1974-1976
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• 1996

An electrostatically driven comb actuator with $525{\mu}m$ height was fabricated using (110) Si anisotropic etching in the Potassium Hydroxide(KOH) solution. The etch-rate and etch-rate ratio are strongly dependent on the weight % and temperature of KOH solution. We developed the optimal condition for the anisotropic etching on (110) wafer with varying these conditions. The force that the comb-drive actuator generates is inversely proportional to the distance of gap and proportional to the height of the comb electrodes. The electrodes must have the high aspect ratio. The (110) Si anisotropic etching is very useful to get a high aspect ratio structure.