• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.130-135
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• 2023

Plasma-resistant ceramic (PRC) is a material used to prevent internal damage in plasma processing equipment for semiconductors and displays. The challenge is to suppress particles falling off from damaged surfaces and increase retention time in order to improve productivity and introduce the latest miniaturization process. Here, we confirmed the effect of suppressing plasma deterioration and reducing the etch rate through surface treatment of existing PRC with an initial illumination level of 200 nm. In particular, quartz glass showed a decrease in etch rate of up to 10%. Furthermore, it is believed that micro-scale secondary particles formed on the microstructure of each material grow as crystals during the fluoridation process. This is a factor that can act as a killer defect when dropped, and is an essential consideration when analyzing plasma resistance. The plasma etching suppression effect of the initial illumination is thought to be due to partial over etching at the dihedral angle of the material due to the sputtering of re-emission of Ar+-based cations. This means that plasma damage due to densification can also be interpreted in existing PRC studies. The research results are significant in that they present surface treatment conditions that can be directly applied to existing PRC for mass production and a new perspective to analyze plasma resistance in addition to simple etching rates.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.67-70
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• 2013

In this study, we changed the input parameters (gas mixing ratio, RF power, DC bias voltage, and process pressure), and then monitored the effect on TiN etch rate and selectivity with $SiO_2$. When the RF power, DC-bias voltage, and process pressure were fixed at 700 W, - 150 V, and 15 mTorr, the etch rate of TiN increased with increasing $CF_4$ content from 0 to 20 % in $CF_4$/Ar plasma. The TiN etch rate reached maximum at 20% $CF_4$ addition. As RF power, DC bias voltage, and process pressure increased, all ranges of etch rates for TiN thin films showed increasing trends. The analysis of x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was carried out to investigate the chemical reactions between the surfaces of TiN and etch species. Based on experimental data, ion-assisted chemical etching was proposed as the main etch mechanism for TiN thin films in $CF_4$/Ar plasma.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.145-145
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• 2008

High-k materials have been paid much more attention for their characteristics with high permittivity to reduce the leakage current through the scaled gate oxide. Among the high-k materials, $ZrO_2$ is one of the most attractive ones combing such favorable properties as a high dielectric constant (k= 20 ~ 25), wide band gap (5 ~ 7 eV) as well as a close thermal expansion coefficient with Si that results in good thermal stability of the $ZrO_2$/Si structure. During the etching process, plasma etching has been widely used to define fine-line patterns, selectively remove materials over topography, planarize surfaces, and trip photoresist. About the high-k materials etching, the relation between the etch characteristics of high-k dielectric materials and plasma properties is required to be studied more to match standard processing procedure with low damaged removal process. Among several etching techniques, we chose the inductively coupled plasma (ICP) for high-density plasma, easy control of ion energy and flux, low ownership and simple structure. And the $BCl_3$ was included in the gas due to the effective extraction of oxygen in the form of $BCl_xO_y$ compounds. During the etching process, the wafer surface temperature is an important parameter, until now, there is less study on temperature parameter. In this study, the etch mechanism of $ZrO_2$ thin film was investigated in function of $Cl_2$ addition to $BCl_3$/Ar gas mixture ratio, RF power and DC-bias power based on substrate temperature increased from $10^{\circ}C$ to $80^{\circ}C$. The variations of relative volume densities for the particles were measured with optical emission spectroscopy (OES). The surface imagination was measured by scanning emission spectroscope (SEM). The chemical state of film was investigated using energy dispersive X-ray (EDX).

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.266-270
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• 2003

We studied BCl$_3$ dry etching of GaAs in a planar inductively coupled plasma system. The investigated process parameters were planar ICP source power, chamber pressure, RIE chuck power and gas flow rate. The ICP source power was varied from 0 to 500 W. Chamber pressure, RIE chuck power and gas flow rate were controlled from 5 to 15 mTorr, 0 to 150 W and 10 to 40 sccm, respectively. We found that a process condition at 20 sccm $BCl_3$ 300 W ICP, 100 W RIE and 7.5 mTorr chamber pressure gave an excellent etch result. The etched GaAs feature depicted extremely smooth surface (RMS roughness < 1 nm), vertical sidewall, relatively fast etch rate (> $3000\AA$/min) and good selectivity to a photoresist (> 3 : 1). XPS study indicated a very clean surface of the material after dry etching of GaAs. We also noticed that our planar ICP source was successfully ignited both with and without RIE chuck power, which was generally not the case with a typical cylindrical ICP source, where assistance of RIE chuck power was required for turning on a plasma and maintaining it. It demonstrated that the planar ICP source could be a very versatile tool for advanced dry etching of damage-sensitive compound semiconductors.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.527-532
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• 2001

Dry etching of copper film using $O_2$ plasma and H(hfac) has been investigated. A one-step process consisting of copper film oxidation with an $O_2$ plasma and the removal of surface copper oxide by the reaction with H(hfac) to form volatile Cu(hfac)$_2$ and $H_2O$ was carried but. The etching rate of Cu in the range from 50 to 700 /min was obtained depending on the substrate temperature, the H(hfac)/O$_2$ flow rate ratio, and the plasma power. The copper film etch rate increased with increasing RF power at the temperatures higher than 215$^{\circ}C$. The optimum H(hfac)/O$_2$ flow rate ratio was 1:1, suggesting that the oxidation process and the reaction with H(hfac) should be in balance. Cu patterning using a Ti mask was performed at a flow rate ratio of 1:1 on 25$0^{\circ}C$\ulcorner and an isotropic etching profile with a taper slope of 30$^{\circ}$was obtained. Cu dry patterning with a tapered angle which is necessary for the advanced high resolution large area thin film transistor liquid-crystal displays was thus successfully obtained from one step process by manipulating the substrate temperature, RF power, and flow rate ratio.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.380-381
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• 2012

Bioinspired sea urchin-like structures were fabricated on silicon by inductively coupled plasma (ICP) etching using lens-like shape hexagonally patterned photoresist (PR) patterns and subsequent metal-assisted chemical etching (MaCE) [1]. The lens-like shape PR patterns with a diameter of 2 ${\mu}m$ were formed by conventional lithography method followed by thermal reflow process of PR patterns on a hotplate at $170^{\circ}C$ for 40 s. ICP etching process was carried out in an SF6 plasma ambient using an optimum etching conditions such as radio-frequency power of 50 W, ICP power of 25 W, SF6 flow rate of 30 sccm, process pressure of 10 mTorr, and etching time of 150 s in order to produce micron structure with tapered etch profile. 15 nm thick Ag film was evaporated on the samples using e-beam evaporator with a deposition rate of 0.05 nm/s. To form Ag nanoparticles (NPs), the samples were thermally treated (thermally dewetted) in a rapid thermal annealing system at $500^{\circ}C$ for 1 min in a nitrogen environment. The Ag thickness and thermal dewetting conditions were carefully chosen to obtain isolated Ag NPs. To fabricate needle-like nanostructures on both the micron structure (i.e., sea urchin-like structures) and flat surface of silicon, MaCE process, which is based on the strong catalytic activity of metal, was performed in a chemical etchant (HNO3: HF: H2O = 4: 1: 20) using Ag NPs at room temperature for 1 min. Finally, the residual Ag NPs were removed by immersion in a HNO3 solution. The fabricated structures after each process steps are shown in figure 1. It is well-known that the hierarchical micro- and nanostructures have efficient light harvesting properties [2-3]. Therefore, this fabrication technique for production of sea urchin-like structures is applicable to improve the performance of light harvesting devices.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.133-138
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• 1999

Research on the etching reaction of UO$_2$ with CF$_4$/O$_2$gas mixture plasma is carried out. The reaction rates are investigated as a function of CF$_4$/O$_2$ ratio, plasma power, and substrate temperature. It is found that there exists an optimum CF$_4$/O$_2$ ratio around 4:1 at all temperatures up to 37$0^{\circ}C$ and surface analysis using XPS X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy) confirms the result. Peak rate at the optimum gas composition increases with increasing temperature. Highest rate obtained in this study leaches 1050 monolayers/min. at 37$0^{\circ}C$ under r. f. power of 150 W, which is equivalent to about 0.5${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$/min. The rate also increases with increasing r. f. power, thus, higher power and higher substrate temperature will undoubtedly raise the etching reaction rate much further. This reaction seems to be an activated process, whose activation energy will be derived in the following experiments.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2004.11a
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• pp.29-32
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• 2004

This work was devoted to an investigation of etching mechanisms for $(Ba,Sr)TiO_3$ (BST) thin films in inductively coupled $CF_4/Ar$ plasma. We have found that an increase of the Ar content in $CF_4/Ar$ plasma causes non-monotonic behavior of BST etch rate, which reaches a maximum value of 40 nm/min at 80% Ar. Langmuir probe measurements show a weak sensitivity of both electron temperature and electron density to the change of $CF_5/Ar$ mixing ratio. O-D model for plasma chemistry gave monotonic changes of both volume densities and fluxes for active species responsible for the etching process. The analysis of surface kinetics confirms the possibility of non-monotonic etch rate behavior due to the concurrence of physical and chemical pathways in ion-assisted chemical reaction.

• Journal of Powder Materials
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.293-299
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• 2020

W₂C is synthesized through a reaction-sintering process from an ultrafine-W and WC powder mixture using spark plasma sintering (SPS). The effect of various parameters, such as W:WC molar ratio, sintering temperature, and sintering time, on the synthesis behavior of W₂C is investigated through X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis of the microstructure, and final sintered density. Further, the etching properties of a W₂C specimen are analyzed. A W₂C sintered specimen with a particle size of 2.0 ㎛ and a relative density over 98% could be obtained from a W-WC powder mixture with 55 mol%, after SPS at 1700℃ for 20 min under a pressure of 50 MPa. The sample etching rate is similar to that of SiC. Based on X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis, it is confirmed that fluorocarbon-based layers such as C-F and C-F2 with lower etch rates are also formed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2010.02a
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• pp.213-213
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• 2010

Magnetic random access memory (MRAM), based on magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) and CMOS, is one of the best semiconductor memories because it can provide nonvolatility, fast access time, unlimited read/write endurance, low operating voltage and high storage density. For the realization of high density MRAM, the etching of MTJ stack with good properties is one of a key process. Recently, there has been great interest in the MTJ stack using MgO as barrier layer for its huge room temperature MR ratio. The use of MgO barrier layer will undoubtedly accelerate the development of MTJ stack for MRAM. In this study, high-density plasma reactive ion etching of MgO films was investigated in an inductively coupled plasma of $Cl_2$/Ar gas mixes. The etch rate, etch selectivity and etch profile of this magnetic film were examined on vary gas concentration. As the $Cl_2$ gas concentration increased, the etch rate of MgO monotonously decreased and etch slop was slanted. The effective of etch parameters including coil rf power, dc-bais voltage, and gas pressure on the etch profile of MgO thin film was explored, At high coil rf power, high dc-bais voltage, low gas pressure, the etching of MgO displayed better etch profiles. Finally, the clean and vertical etch sidewall of MgO films was achieved using $Cl_2$/Ar plasma at the optimized etch conditions.