Etching

The Nano Fabrication Facility at IOM comprises three separate areas in cleanroom ranging from ISO5 to ISO7.

Etching facilities are hosted in the ISO7 Lithography and Etching lab. Dry etching (both RIE and ICP-RIE) equipped with fluorine-based chemistry and inert gases allow both physical erosion and chemical etches on Silicon and its oxides and nitrides. Several chemical hoods are available to be used for a wide variety of wet etching processes.  Heated baths and sonicators, optical and stylus profilometry, optical and scanning electron microscopy complement the etching facility with metrology and process control capabilities.


Dry etching

  • ICP-RIE for deep dry etching of silicon, silicon nitride, silicon oxide
  • RIE for plasma treatment (oxygen, nitrogen), dry etching and pattern transfer on silicon based substrates


Wet etching

  • strong inorganic acids (sulphuric, chloridric, phosphoric, nitric, etc)
  • Fluoridric acid and buffered oxide etches
  • organic acids (citric, acetic, etc)
  • strong bases (KOH, NaOH, TMAH, etc)
  • standard cleaning agents (RCAs, organic solvents, etc)
  • specialized etching preparations (basic and acid chromium etch, etc)