• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2004.10a
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• pp.373-378
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• 2004

Recently the electrostatic 2-axis MEMS stages have been fabricated for the purpose of an application to PSD (Probebased Storage Device). However, most of them have low area efficiency, which is undesirable as data storage devices, since all of the components (springs, comb electrodes, anchors, platform, etc.) are placed in-plane. In this paper, we present a novel structure of electrostatic 2-axis MEMS stage that is characterized by having large area platform. For large area efficiency, the actuator part consisting of mainly comb electrodes and springs is placed right below the platform. In this article, the structures and operational principle of the MEMS stages are described, followed by design procedure, structural and modal analysis using FEM(Finite Element Method). The area efficiency of the MEMS stage was designed to be about 55％, that is very large compared with conventional ones having a few percentage.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.22 no.11 s.176
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• pp.173-181
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• 2005

We report on the design and fabrication of an electrostatic 2-axis MEMS stage possessing a platform with a size of $5{times}5mm^2$. The stage, as a key component, would be used in developing probe-based storage devices in the future. It was fabricated by forming numerous $5{\times}5{\mu}m^2$ etching holes in the central platform, as a result, reducing the total number of masks to 1, thereby simplifying the whole fabrication process. Experimental results show that the driving range of the stage was $32{\mu}m$ at the supplied voltage of 20V and the natural frequency was approximately 300Hz. The mechanical coupling between x- and y-motion was also measured and verified to be $25\%$.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.23 no.9 s.186
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• pp.179-189
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• 2006

Recently the electrostatic 2-axis MEMS stages have been fabricated f3r the purpose of an application to PSD (Probe-based Storage Device). However, all of the components (platform, comb electrodes, springs, anchors, etc.) in those stages are placed in-plane so that they have low areal efficiencies such as a few percentage, which is undesirable as data storage devices. In this paper, we present a novel structure of an electrostatic 2-axis MEMS stage that is characterized by having a large areal efficiency of about 25%. For obtaining large area efficiency, the actuator part consisting of mainly comb electrodes and springs is placed right below the platform. The structure and operational principle of the MEMS stage are described, followed by a design and analysis, the fabrication and measurement results. Experimental results show that the driving ranges of the fabricated stage along the x and y axis were 27$\mu$m, 38$\mu$m at the supplied voltages of 65V, 70V, respectively and the natural frequencies along x and y axis were 180Hz, 310Hz, respectively. The total size of the stage is about 5.9$\times$6.8mm$^2$ and the platform size is about 2.7$\times$3.6mm$^2$.

• Journal of Applied Reliability
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.23-29
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• 2007

Probe card is a test component which is to classify the known good die with electrical contact before the packaging in the ATE (automatic testing equipment). Conventional probe tip was mostly needle type, it has been difficult to meet with conventional type, because of decreasing chip size, pad to pad pitch and pads size increasingly. For that reason, probe cards using MEMS (micro electro mechanical system) technology have been developed for various semiconductor chips. In this paper, Area Array type MEMS Probe tip was designed,, fabricated, and characterized its mechanical and electrical properties. The authors found that good electrical characteristics under $1{\Omega}$ were acquired with gold (Au) and aluminium (Al) pad contact test over 0.5gf and 4gf respectively. And, contact resistance variation under $0.1{\Omega}$ were achieved with 100,000 times of repetition test. And, insertion loss (IS) for high frequency operation was ascertained over 300MHz at -3dB loss.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.63-66
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• 2013

This paper describes the highly productive process technologies of microprobe arrays, which were used for a probe card to test a Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM) chip with fine pitch pads. Cantilever-type microprobe arrays were fabricated using conventional micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) process technologies. Bonding material, gold-tin (Au-Sn) paste, was used to bond the Ni-Co alloy microprobes to the ceramic space transformer. The electrical and mechanical characteristics of a probe card with fabricated microprobes were measured by a conventional probe card tester. A probe card assembled with the fabricated microprobes showed good x-y alignment and planarity errors within ${\pm}5{\mu}m$ and ${\pm}10{\mu}m$, respectively. In addition, the average leakage current and contact resistance were approximately 1.04 nA and 0.054 ohm, respectively. The proposed highly productive microprobes can be applied to a MEMS probe card, to test a DRAM chip with fine pitch pads.

• KIEE International Transactions on Electrophysics and Applications
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• v.4C no.4
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• pp.149-154
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• 2004

This paper presents a silicon probe tip for vertical probe card application. The silicon probe tip was fabricated using MEMS technology such as porous silicon micromachining and deep- RIE (reactive ion etching). The thickness of the silicon epitaxial layers was 5 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ and 7 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$, respectively. The width and length were 40 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ and 600 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$, respectively. The probe structure was a multilayered structure and was composed of Au/Ni-Cr/Si$_3$N$_4$/n-epi layers. The height of the curled probe tip was measured as a function of the annealing temperature and time. Resistance characteristics of the probe tip were measured using a touchdown test.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.27 no.7
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• pp.1234-1242
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• 2003

In this paper we present a simple and efficient robust optimal design formulation for MEMS structures and its application to a resonant-type micro probe. The basic idea is to use the gradient index (GI) to improve robustness of the objective and constraint functions. In the robust optimal design procedure, a deterministic optimization for performance of MEMS structures is followed by design sensitivity analysis with respect to uncertainties such as fabrication errors and change of operating conditions. During the process of deterministic optimization and sensitivity analysis, dominant performance and uncertain variables are identified to define GI. The GI is incorporated as a term of objective and constraint functions in the robust optimal design formulation to make both performance and robustness improved. While most previous approaches for robust optimal design require statistical information on design variations, the proposed GI based method needs no such information and therefore is cost-effective and easily applicable to early design stages. For the micro probe example, robust optimums are obtained to satisfy the targets for the measurement sensitivity and they are compared in terms of robustness and production yield with the deterministic optimums through the Monte Carlo simulation. This method, although shown for MEMS structures, may as well be easily applied to conventional mechanical structures where information on uncertainties is lacking but robustness is highly important.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.1730-1733
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• 2007

As semiconductor and MEMS devices become smaller, testing process during their production should follow such a high density trend. A circuit inspection tool "probe card" makes contact with electrode pads of the device under test (DUT). Nowadays, electrode pads are irregularly arranged and have height difference. In order to absorb variations in the heights of electrode pads and to generate contact loads, contact probes must have some levels of mechanical spring properties. Contact probes must also yield a force to break the surface native oxide layer or contamination layer on the electrodes to make electric contact. In this research, new vertical micro contact probe with bellows shape is developed to overcome shortage of prior work. Especially, novel bellows shape is used to reduce stress concentration in this design and stopper is used to change the stiffness of micro contact probe. Variable stiffness can be one solution to overcome the height difference of electrode pads.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.68-68
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• 2009

최근 디스플레이 산업의 발달로 LCD 판넬의 수요가 급증함에 따라 검사장치 분야도 동반 성장하고 있다. LCD 검사를 위한 probe unit은 미세전기기계시스템 (MEMS) 공정을 이용하여 제작된다. 본 연구에서는 probe card의 미세 슬릿을 제작하기 위한 Si 깊은 식각 공정을 수행하였다. 공정에 사용된 장비는 STS 사의 D-RIE 시스템으로 식각가스로 $SF_6$, passivation용으로 $C_4F_8$ 가스를 각각 사용하였다. 식각용 마스크는 $30{\sim}50{\mu}m$의 선폭을 probe card의 패턴에 따라 제작되었으며, 분석은 SEM 측정을 이용하였다. 식각 공정 중 발생하는 scallop은 시료를 oxidation 시켜 $SiO_2$ 층을 형성한 후에 식각용액에 에칭하여 제거하였다. 제거전 scallop의 크기는 약 120 nm에서 제거후 약 $50{\mu}m$로 크게 개선됨을 SEM 사진으로 확인하였다.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Electromagnetic Engineering and Science
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• v.21 no.7
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• pp.831-841
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• 2010

The conventional vertical probe has the thin and long signal path that makes transfer characteristic of probe worse because of the S-shaped structure. So we propose the new vertical probe structure that has branch springs in the S-shaped probe. It makes closed loop when the probe mechanically connects to the electrode on a wafer. We fabricated the proposed vertical probe and measured the transfer characteristic and mechanical properties. Compared to the conventional S-shaped vertical probe, the proposed probe has the overdrive that is 1.2 times larger and the contact force that is 2.5 times larger. And we got the improved transfer characteristic by 1.4 dB in $0{\sim}10$ GHz. Also we developed the simulation model of the probe card by using full-wave simulator and the simulation result is correlated with measurement one. As a result of this simulation model, the cantilever probe and PCB have the worst transfer characteristic in the probe card.