• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.271-275
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• 2008

The MAM(Megasonic Agitated Module) has been fabricated for improving the characteristics of wet etching. The characteristics of the MAM are investigated during the wet etching with and without megasonic agitation in this paper. The adoption of the MAM has improved the characteristics of wet etching, such as the etch rate, etch uniformity, and surface roughness. Especially, the etching uniformity on the entire wafer was less than ${\pm}1%$ in both cases of Si and glass. Generally, the initial root-mean-square roughness($R_{rms}$) of the single crystal silicon was 0.23nm. Roughnesses of 566nm and 66nm have been achieved with magnetic stirring and ultrasonic agitation, respectively, by some researchers. In this paper, the roughness of the etched Si surface is less than 60 nm. Wet etching of silicon with megasonic agitation can maintain nearly the original surface roughness during etching. The results verified that megasonic agitation is an effective way to improve etching characteristics of the etch rate, etch uniformity, and surface roughness and that the developed micromachining system is suitable for the fabrication of devices with complex structures.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 1997.05a
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• pp.26-26
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• 1997

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Technology Engineers
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.533-538
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• 2014

We fabricated grooved mushroom structures with anisotropic wettability on silicon substrates using basic MEMS processes. The geometry of these grooved mushroom structures could be changed by controlling the additional IPA solution during Si etching by TMAH solution. To understand anisotropic wettability, contact angles (CAs) of hexadecane droplets were measured in the orthogonal and parallel directions to grooved lines. The CA measurement results displayed anisotropic wetting on the grooved mushroom structures. However, specimens with $80{\mu}m$ distance between top layers displayed isotropic and superoleophobic wetting. This study demonstrates that the thickness of the top layer is more critical than the width or height of the ridge when determining the wettability of organic solvent. Despite the wide distance between top layers ($80{\mu}m$), the specimen with a thin top layer (100 nm) showed highly anisotropic wetting and low CA due to the pinning of droplets at the edge of the top layer.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2013

This review article summarizes metal-assisted chemical etching (MAC etch or MACE), an anisotropic etching method for Si, and describes principles, main factors, and recent achievements in literature. In 1990, it was discovered that, with metal catalyst on surface and $H_2O_2$/HF as etchant, Si substrate can be etched anisotropically, in even in solution. In contrast to high-cost vacuum-based dry etching methods, MAC etch enables to fabricate a variety of high aspect ratio nanostructures through wet etching process.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2005.06a
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• pp.1522-1526
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• 2005

In this study, the fabrication of large area silicon mirror is accomplished by anisotropic etching using MEMS for implementation of integrated optical pickup and the process condition is also established for improving the mirror surface roughness. Until now, few results have been reported about the production of highly stepped $9.74^{\circ}$ off-axis-cut silicon wafer using wet etching. In addition rough surface of the mirror is achieved in case of long etching time. Hence a novel method called magnetorheolocal finishing is introduced to enhancing the surface quality of the mirror plane. Finally, areal peak to valley surface roughness of mirror plane is reduced about 100nm in large area of $mm^2$ and it is applicable to optical pickup using infrared wavelength.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.24-31
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• 2004

Masking effect of the nanoscratched silicon (100) surface was studied and applied to a maskless nanofabrication technique. First, the surface of the silicon (100) was machined by ductile-regime nanomachining process using the scratch option of the Nanoindenter${ \circledR}$ XP. To clarify the possibility of the nanoscratched silicon surfaces for the application to wet etching mask, the etching characteristic with a KOH solution was evaluated at room temperature. After the etching process, the convex nanostructures were made due to the masking effect of the mechanically affected layer. Moreover, the height and the width of convex structures were controlled with varying normal loads during nanoscratch.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.116-122
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• 2013

For fabricating silicon solar cells with high conversion efficiency, texturing is one of the most effective techniques to increase short circuit current by enhancing light trapping. In this study, four different types of textures, large V-groove, large U-groove, small V-groove, and small U-groove, were prepared by a wet etching process. Silicon substrates with V-grooves were fabricated by an anisotropic etching process using a KOH solution mixed with isopropyl alcohol (IPA), and the size of the V-grooves was controlled by varying the concentration of IPA. The isotropic etching process following anisotropic etching resulted in U-grooves and the isotropic etching time was determined to obtain U-grooves with an opening angle of approximately $60^{\circ}$. The results indicated that U-grooves had a larger diffuse reflectance than V-grooves and the reflectances of small grooves was slightly higher than those of large grooves depending on the size of the grooves. Then amorphous Si:H thin film solar cells were fabricated on textured substrates to investigate the light trapping effect of textures with different shapes and sizes. Among the textures fabricated in this work, the solar cells on the substrate with small U-grooves had the largest short circuit current, 19.20 mA/$cm^2$. External quantum efficiency data also demonstrated that the small, U-shape textures are more effective for light trapping than large, V-shape textures.

• Proceedings of the KAIS Fall Conference
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• 2000.10a
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• pp.185-193
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• 2000

이방성 습식 식각을 이용하여 멤브레인을 제작하기 위하여 KOH-IPA의 식각액을 사용하여 단결정 실리콘 기판을 이방성으로 식각을 하고, 각 용액에 대한 식각 특성을 관찰하였다. 식각률은 식각액의 온도와 농도에 의존하며, 패턴 형성 방향과 식각액의 농도에 따라 식각 형태가 다르게 나타났다. 패턴은 Primary Flat에 45°로 기울여 형성되었으며 20wt·% KOH 80℃ 이상에서는 U-groove, 그 이하의 온도와 농도에서는 V-groove 식각 형태를 관찰할 수 있었다. 각 면에 대한 식각률 차이에 의해서 생기는 Hillock은 온도와 농도가 높아짐에 따라 줄어들었고, 재식각을 퉁하여 현저하게 줄어듦을 알 수 있었다.

• Korean Journal of Crystallography
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.93-104
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• 2003

The crystals of group-Ⅲ nitride semiconductors with wurtzite structure exhibit a strong polarity. Especially, GaN has characteristics of different growth rate, anisotropic electrical and optical properties due to the polarity. In this work, GaN epilayer was grown and the polarities of the crystals were observed by the chemical wet etching and SP-EFM. GaN thin films were deposited on c-plane A1₂O₃ substrate under the variations of growth conditions by HVPE such as the deposition temperature of the buffer layer, the deposition time, the ratio of Group-V and Ⅲ and the deposition temperature of the film. The adquate results were obtained under the conditions of 500℃, 90 seconds, 1333 and 1080℃, respectively. It is observed that the GaN layer grown without the buffer layer has N-polarity and the GaN layer grown on the buffer layer has Ga-polarity. Fine crystal single particles were grown on c-plane A1₂O₃ and SiO₂, layer. The external shape of the crystal shows ｛10-11｝｛10-10｝(000-1) planes as expected in the PBC theory and anisotropic behavior along c-axis is obvious. As a result of etching on each plane, (000-1) and ｛10-11｝planes were etched strongly due to the N-polarity and ｛10-10｝ plane was not affected due to the non-polarity. In the case of the crystal grown on c-plane A1₂O₃, two types of crystals were grown. They were hexagonal pyramidal-shape with ｛10-11｝plane and hexagonal prism with basal plane. The latter might be grown by twin plane reentrant edge (TPRE) growth.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.418-418
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• 2008

The electrochemical etching of silicon in HF-based solutions is known to form various types of porous structures. Porous structures are generally classified into three categories according to pore sizes: micropore (below 2 nm in size), mesopore (2 ~ 50 nm), and macropore (above 50 nm). Recently, the formation of macropores has attracted increasing interest because of their promising characteristics for an wide scope of applications such as microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), chemical sensors, biotechnology, photonic crystals, and photovoltaic application. One of the promising applications of macropores is in the field of MEMS. Anisotropic etching is essential step for fabrication of MEMS. Conventional wet etching has advantages such as low processing cost and high throughput, but it is unsuitable to fabricate high-aspect-ratio structures with vertical sidewalls due to its inherent etching characteristics along certain crystal orientations. Reactive ion dry etching is another technique of anisotropic etching. This has excellent ability to fabricate high-aspect-ratio structures with vertical sidewalls and high accuracy. However, its high processing cost is one of the bottlenecks for widely successful commercialization of MEMS. In contrast, by using electrochemical etching method together with pre-patterning by lithographic step, regular macropore arrays with very high-aspect-ratio up to 250 can be obtained. The formed macropores have very smooth surface and side, unlike deep reactive ion etching where surfaces are damaged and wavy. Especially, to make vertical microwire or nanowire arrays (aspect ratio = over 1:100) on silicon wafer with top-down photolithography, it is very difficult to fabricate them with conventional dry etching. The electrochemical etching is the most proper candidate to do it. The pillar structures are demonstrated for n-type silicon and the formation mechanism is well explained, while such a experimental results are few for p-type silicon. In this report, In order to understand the roles played by the kinds of etching solution and mask patterns in the formation of microwire arrays, we have undertaken a systematic study of the solvent effects in mixtures of HF, dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), iso-propanol, and mixtures of HF with water on the structure formation on monocrystalline p-type silicon with a resistivity with 10 ~ 20 $\Omega{\cdot}cm$. The different morphological results are presented according to mask patterns and etching solutions.