• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Surface Engineering Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.90-90
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• 2008

실리콘을 기판으로 하는 대부분의 태양전지에서는 표면반사에 의한 광에너지손실을 최소화시키고자 습식에칭(wet etching)에 의한 텍스쳐링처리가 이루어진다. 그러나 습식 에칭은 공정 과정이 번거롭고 비용이 많이 든다. Inductively Coupled Plasma Etcher 장비를 이용한 플라즈마 에칭 (plasma etching)을 실리콘 표면에 적용하여 공정을 간단하고 저렴하게 하며 반사도를 획기적으로 낮추는 기술이 개발되었다. 습식 에칭으로 형성된 표면의 피라미드 구조는 1차 반사 후 빛의 일부가 외부로 흩어져 나가지만 플라즈마 에칭으로 형성된 나노구조는 내부전반사가 가능하여 대부분의 태양 에너지를 흡수한다. 나노구조는 필라(pillar)의 형태로 형성되며 이 필라의 길이에 따라 반사도가 다르게 나타난다. 이는 플라즈마 에칭 시 발생하는 이온폭격과 에칭 측벽 식각 보호막(SiOxFy : Silicon- Oxy- Fluoride)이 필라의 길이에 영향을 주기 때문이며, 필라가 길수록 반사도를 저하시킨다. 최저의 반사도를 얻기 위해서 나노필라 형성에 기여하는 플라즈마 에칭 시간, RF bias power, SF6/O2 gas ratio의 변화에 따른 실험이 진행되었다. 플라즈마 발생 초기에는 표면의 거칠기만 증가할 뿐 필라가 형성되지 않지만 특정조건에서 3um 이상의 필라를 얻는다. 이는 에칭 측벽 식각 억제막이 약한 부분으로 이온폭격이 집중되어 발생한다. 플라즈마 에칭을 적용하여 형성된 나노필라는 반사도가 가시광 영역에서 대략 1%에 불과하며, 마스크 없이 공정이 가능한 장점이 있다.

• 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 Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.430.2-430.2
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• 2016

The front transparent conductive oxide (TCO) films in thin fill solar cell should exhibit high transparency, conductivity, good surface morphology and excellent light scattering properties. The light trapping phenomenon is limited due to random surface structure of TCO films. The proper control of surface structure and uniform cauliflower TCO films may be appropriate for efficient light trapping. We report light trapping scheme of ICP-RIE glass texturing by SF6/Ar plasma for high roughness and haze ratio of ITO films. It was observed that the variation of etching time, pattern size and Ar flow ratio during ICP-RIE process were important factors to improve the diffused transmittance and haze ratio of textured glass. The ICP-RIE textured glass showed low etching rates due to the presence of metal elements like Al, B, F and Na. The ITO films deposited on textured glass substrates showed the high RMS roughness and haze ratio in the visible wavelength region. The change in surface morphology showed negligible influence on electrical and structural properties of ITO films. The ITO films with high roughness and haze ratio can be used to improve the performance of thin film solar cells.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Telematics and Electronics
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• v.26 no.7
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• pp.50-57
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• 1989

Tapered etching of polysilicon films has been achieved by implanting phosphorus ions into the polysilicon film and using plasma etch in either $CF_4-O_2\;or\;SF_6$. A two-step plasma etching method is also proposed to control the taper angle of the etched edge without changing the implantion conditions. The taper angle is determined by the ratio of the etch rate of the undamaged region to that of the damaged top region of the polysilicon layer. The ratio is found to be dependent on the implantion dose, the implantion energy and the anisotropy of etching. The minimum angle in our experiments is about $10^{\circ}$. When the two-step etching method is employed, the taper angles can be controlled from the minimum angle up to about $55^{\circ}$.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2000.04b
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• pp.56-59
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• 2000

In this study, Ferroelectric $Pb(Zr_x,Ti_{1-x})O_3$(x=0.53) thin films were fabricated by the spin-coating on the Pt/Ti/$SiO_2$/Si substrate using the PZT metal alkoxide solutions with various excess Pb contents. Etching of PZT film was performed using planar inductively coupled Ar(20)$/Cl_2/BCl_3$ plasma. The etch rate of PZT film was 2450 ${\AA}/min$ at Ar(20)$/BCl_3$(80) gas mixing ratio and substrate temperature of $80^{\circ}C$. The leakage current densities of before etching and after etching PZT thin film were $6.25\times10^{-8}A/cm^2$, $8.74\times10^{-7}A/cm^2$ with electric field of 0.07MV/em, respectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2010.08a
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• pp.132-132
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• 2010

In the nano-scale Si processing, patterning processes based on multilevel resist structures becoming more critical due to continuously decreasing resist thickness and feature size. In particular, highly selective etching of the first dielectric layer with resist patterns are great importance. In this work, process window for the infinitely high etch selectivity of silicon oxynitride (SiON) layers and silicon nitride (Si3N4) with EUV resist was investigated during etching of SiON/EUV resist and Si3N4/EUV resist in a CH2F2/N2/Ar dual-frequency superimposed capacitive coupled plasma (DFS-CCP) by varying the process parameters, such as the CH2F2 and N2 flow ratio and low-frequency source power (PLF). It was found that the CH2F2/N2 flow ratio was found to play a critical role in determining the process window for ultra high etch selectivity, due to the differences in change of the degree of polymerization on SiON, Si3N4, and EUV resist. Control of N2 flow ratio gave the possibility of obtaining the ultra high etch selectivity by keeping the steady-state hydrofluorocarbon layer thickness thin on the SiON and Si3N4 surface due to effective formation of HCN etch by-products and, in turn, in continuous SiON and Si3N4 etching, while the hydrofluorocarbon layer is deposited on the EUV resist surface.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.80-81
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• 2012

Recently, one of the critical issues in the etching processes of the nanoscale devices is to achieve ultra-high aspect ratio contact (UHARC) profile without anomalous behaviors such as sidewall bowing, and twisting profile. To achieve this goal, the fluorocarbon plasmas with major advantage of the sidewall passivation have been used commonly with numerous additives to obtain the ideal etch profiles. However, they still suffer from formidable challenges such as tight limits of sidewall bowing and controlling the randomly distorted features in nanoscale etching profile. Furthermore, the absence of the available plasma simulation tools has made it difficult to develop revolutionary technologies to overcome these process limitations, including novel plasma chemistries, and plasma sources. As an effort to address these issues, we performed a fluorocarbon surface kinetic modeling based on the experimental plasma diagnostic data for silicon dioxide etching process under inductively coupled C4F6/Ar/O2 plasmas. For this work, the SiO2 etch rates were investigated with bulk plasma diagnostics tools such as Langmuir probe, cutoff probe and Quadruple Mass Spectrometer (QMS). The surface chemistries of the etched samples were measured by X-ray Photoelectron Spectrometer. To measure plasma parameters, the self-cleaned RF Langmuir probe was used for polymer deposition environment on the probe tip and double-checked by the cutoff probe which was known to be a precise plasma diagnostic tool for the electron density measurement. In addition, neutral and ion fluxes from bulk plasma were monitored with appearance methods using QMS signal. Based on these experimental data, we proposed a phenomenological, and realistic two-layer surface reaction model of SiO2 etch process under the overlying polymer passivation layer, considering material balance of deposition and etching through steady-state fluorocarbon layer. The predicted surface reaction modeling results showed good agreement with the experimental data. With the above studies of plasma surface reaction, we have developed a 3D topography simulator using the multi-layer level set algorithm and new memory saving technique, which is suitable in 3D UHARC etch simulation. Ballistic transports of neutral and ion species inside feature profile was considered by deterministic and Monte Carlo methods, respectively. In case of ultra-high aspect ratio contact hole etching, it is already well-known that the huge computational burden is required for realistic consideration of these ballistic transports. To address this issue, the related computational codes were efficiently parallelized for GPU (Graphic Processing Unit) computing, so that the total computation time could be improved more than few hundred times compared to the serial version. Finally, the 3D topography simulator was integrated with ballistic transport module and etch reaction model. Realistic etch-profile simulations with consideration of the sidewall polymer passivation layer were demonstrated.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.53-58
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• 2022

Shape changes of hard mask play a key role in the aspect ratio dependent etch (ARDE). For etch process using high density and energy ions, deformation of hard mask shape becomes more severe, and high aspect ratio (HAR) etch profile is distorted. In this study, polygonal geometric model for shape-deformation of amorphous carbon layered hard mask is suggested to control etch profile during the process. Mask shape is modeled with polygonal geometry consisting of trapezoids and rectangles, and it provides dynamic information about angles of facets and etched width and height of remained mask shape, providing important features for real-time HAR etch profiling.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Navigation and Port Research Conference
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• 2000.11a
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• pp.40-44
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• 2000

In this paper, since the research on the etching of SrBi$_2$Ta$_2$O$_{9}$ (SBT) thin film was few (specially Cl$_2$-base ), we had studied the surface reaction of SBT thin films using the OES in high density plasma etching as a function of rf power, dc bias voltage, and Cl$_2$/(C1$_2$+Ar) gas mixing ratio. It had been found that the etch rate of SBT thin films appeared to be more affected by the physical sputtering between Ar ions and surface of the SBT compared to the chemical reaction in our previous papers$^{1.2}$ . The change of Cl radical density that is measured by the OES as a function of gas combination showed the change of the etch rate of SBT thin films. Therefore, the chemical reactions between Cl radical in plasma and components of the SBT enhance to increase the etch rates of SBT thin films and these results were confirmed by XPS analysis.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2004.07b
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• pp.734-737
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• 2004

The metal-ferroelectric-semiconductor (MFS) structure is widely studied for nondestructive readout (NDRO) memory devices, but conventional MFS structure has a critical problem. It is difficult to obtain ferroelectric films like PZT on Si substrate without interdiffusion of impurities such as Pb, Ti and other elements. In order to solve these problems, the metal-ferroelectric-insulator-semiconductor (MFIS) structure has been proposed with a buffer layer of high dielectric constant such as MgO, $Y_2O_3$, and $CeO_2$. In this study, the etching characteristics (etch rate, selectivity) of MgO thin films were etched using $Cl_2/Ar$ plasma. The maximum etch rate of 85 nm/min for MgO thin films was obtained at $Cl_2$(30%)/Ar(70%) gas mixing ratio. Also, the etch rate was measured by varying the etching parameters such as ICP rf power, dc-bias voltage, and chamber pressure. Plasma diagnostics was performed by Langmuir probe (LP) and optical emission spectroscopy (OES).