• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.102-102
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• 2008

Sapphire (${\alpha}-Al_2O_3$) has been used as the substrate of opto-electronic device because of characteristics of thermal stability, comparatively low cost, large diameter, optical transparency and chemical compatibility. However, there is difficulty in the etching and patterning due to the physical stability of sapphire and the selectivity with sapphire and mask materials [1,2]. Therefore, sapphire has been studied on the various fields and need to be studied, continuously. In this study, the etching properties of sapphire substrate were investigated with various $CH_4$/Ar gas combination, radio frequency (RF) power, DC-bias voltage and process pressure. The characteristics of the plasma were estimated for mechanism using optical emission spectroscopy (OES). The chemical compounds on the surface of sapphire substrate were investigated using energy dispersive X-ray (EDX). The chemical reaction on the surface of the etched sapphire substrate was observed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to investigate the vertical and slope profiles.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.41 no.7
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• pp.493-496
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• 2004

The chemical etching of sapphire substrates was peformed to produce smooth surfaces on an atomic scale. The sapphire sur-face etched by using a $H_2$S $O_4$ solution showed a pit-free morphology and was yen smooth as much as $\sigma$$_{rms}$=0.13 nm, that etched by using a mixture of $H_2$S $O_4$ and $H_3$P $O_4$ contained large pits with $\sigma$$_{rms}$=0.34 nm. The $\sigma$$_{rms}$’s and the number of the pits increased with increasing etching temperature. The sapphire etched by using $H_2$S $O_4$ at 32$0^{\circ}C$ had the best surface. These results provide important information on the effects of etching treatment on the structural properties of sapphire for the growth of high-quality epilayers.ayers.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.7-11
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• 2011

Sapphire substrate was patterned by a selective chemical wet etching technique, and GaN/InGaN structures were grown on this substrate by MOVPE (Metal Organic Vapor Phase Epitaxy). The surface of grown GaN on patterned sapphire substrate (PSS) has good morphology and uniformity. The patterned sapphire substrate LED showed better light output than conventional LED that improvement 50%. We think these results come from enhancement of internal quantum efficiency by decrease of threading dislocation and increase of light extraction efficiency. Also these LED showed more uniform emission distribution in angle than conventional LED.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 1995

The surface of a sapphire substrate used for hetero-epitaxy was chemically polished in a mixture of $H_3PO_4\;and\;H_2SO_4$ solution. The extent of etching for various crystal orientations was found to be dependent on the etching time at $315{\pm}2^{\circ}C$ and at the composition of $H_2SO_4 : H_3PO_4$=3 : 1. In addition, the etching rates of the substrates were investigated in the mixture of $H_2SO_4 : H_3PO_4$=3 : 1 by volume and in the temperature range of 280~320$^{\circ}C$. From the plot of log R against 1/T, the activation penergy ($(E_a)$) was found to be in the order of $({\bar1}012) > (10{\bar1}0) > (11{\bar2}0) > (0001)$ plane. After removing the surface layers of the sapphire with (0001), $({\bar1}012),\;(10{\bar1}0)\;and\;(11{\bar2}0)$ plane by a thickness of 64.6, 46.5, 16.2 and 5.1 ${\mu}m$, respectively, the morphology of the resulting surface was observed by SEM.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.10 no.11
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• pp.784-788
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• 2000

The Vickers microhardness was measured on the basal (0001) plane of sapphire single crystals in the temperature range from 25$^{\circ}C$to 1000$^{\circ}C$. The substructure surrounding the indents was investigated using selective chemical polishing and etching, optical microscopy, and trasmission electron microscopy (TEM). At room temperature, cracks were predominant, and at intermediate temperatures (400$^{\circ}C$and 600$^{\circ}C$), extensive rhombohedral twinning was observed. On the other hand, at higher temperatures, prism plane slip bands on prism plane {1120}(원문참조) were dominant in the microstructure. TEM observations revealed that the dislocation substructure at the vicinity of the indents consisted of fairly straight dislocations lying in basal and/or prism planes and aligned along the <1100> and <1120> directions. The details of the glide dissociation of perfect <110> screw dislocations into three collinear 1/3<1100> partials on the prism plane and the Peierls potential for sapphire single crystals were discussed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.363-363
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• 2008

The development of dry etching process for sapphire wafer with plasma has been key issues for the opto-electric devices. The challenges are increasing control and obtaining low plasma induced-damage because an unwanted scattering of radiation is caused by the spatial disorder of pattern and variation of surface roughness. The plasma-induced damages during plasma etching process can be classified as impurity contamination of residual etch products or bonding disruption in lattice due to charged particle bombardment. Therefor, fine pattern technology with low damaged etching process and high etch rate are urgently needed. Until now, there are a lot of reports on the etching of sapphire wafer with using $Cl_2$/Ar, $BCl_3$/Ar, HBr/Ar and so on [1]. However, the etch behavior of sapphire wafer have investigated with variation of only one parameter while other parameters are fixed. In this study, we investigated the effect of pressure and other parameters on the etch rate and the selectivity. We selected $BCl_3$ as an etch ant because $BCl_3$ plasmas are widely used in etching process of oxide materials. In plasma, the $BCl_3$ molecule can be dissociated into B radical, $B^+$ ion, Cl radical and $Cl^+$ ion. However, the $BCl_3$ molecule can be dissociated into B radical or $B^+$ ion easier than Cl radical or $Cl^+$ ion. First, we evaluated the etch behaviors of sapphire wafer in $BCl_3$/additive gases (Ar, $N_2,Cl_2$) gases. The behavior of etch rate of sapphire substrate was monitored as a function of additive gas ratio to $BCl_3$ based plasma, total flow rate, r.f. power, d.c. bias under different pressures of 5 mTorr, 10 mTorr, 20 mTorr and 30 mTorr. The etch rates of sapphire wafer, $SiO_2$ and PR were measured with using alpha step surface profiler. In order to understand the changes of radicals, volume density of Cl, B radical and BCl molecule were investigated with optical emission spectroscopy (OES). The chemical states of $Al_2O_3$ thin films were studied with energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) and depth profile anlysis of auger electron spectroscopy (AES). The enhancement of sapphire substrate can be explained by the reactive ion etching mechanism with the competition of the formation of volatile $AlCl_3$, $Al_2Cl_6$ or $BOCl_3$ and the sputter effect by energetic ions.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.199-205
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• 2006

Patterned sapphire substrates (PSS) were fabricated by a simple wet etching process with $SiO_2$ stripe masks and a mixed solution of $H_2SO_4$ and $H_3PO_4$. GaN layers were epitaxially grown on the PSS under the optimized 2-step growth condition of metalorganic vapor deposition. During the 1st growth step, GaN layers with triangular cross sections were grown on the selected area of the surface of the PSS, and in the 2nd growth step, the GaN layers were laterally grown and coalesced with neighboring GaN layers. The density of threading dislocations on the surface of the coalesced GaN layer was $2{\sim}4\;{\times}\;10^7\;cm^{-2}$ over the entire region. The epitaxial structure of near-UV light emitting diode (LED) was grown over the GaN layers on the PSS. The internal quantum efficiency and the extraction efficiency of the LED structure grown on the PSS were remarkably increased when compared to the conventional LED structure grown on the flat sapphire substrate. The reduction in TD density and the decrease in the number of times of total internal reflections of the light flux are mainly attributed due to high level of scattering on the PSS.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.218-223
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• 2001

The chemical-mechanical polishing process was carried out for 2"-dia. sapphire wafer grown by horizontalBridgman method on the urethane lapping pad with the silica sol. The polished wafer shows the full-width at halfmaximum of 200~400 arcsec in double-crystal X-ray diffraction, indicating that the slicing, grinding and lapping processes before the polishing process affected the crystalline structural property of the wafer surface by the mechanical residual stress. For the inclusion of surface treatments after chemical-mechanical polishing such as the thermal annealing at the temperature of $1,200^{\circ}C$for 4 hrs. and chemical etching, the crystalline quality was sigdicantly enhanced with the reduced full-width at half maximum up to 8.3 arcsec.arcsec.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2009.05a
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• pp.38.1-38.1
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• 2009

Plasma etching is an essential process for electronic device industries and the particulate contamination during plasma etching has been interested as a big issue for the yield of productivity. The oxynitride glasses have a merit to prevent particulate contamination due to their amorphous structure and plasma etching resistance. The YSiAlON oxynitride glasses with increasing nitrogen content were manufactured. Each oxynitride glasses were fluorine-plasma etched and their plasma etching rate and surface roughness were compared with reference materials such as sapphire, alumina and quartz. The reinforcement mechanism of plasma etching resistance of the YSiAlON glasses studied by depth profiling at plasma etched surface using electron spectroscopy for chemical analysis. The plasma etching rate decreased with nitrogen content and there was no selective etching at the plasma etched surface of the oxynitride glasses. The concentration of silicon was very low due to the generation of SiF4 very volatile byproduct and the concentration of aluminum and yttrium was relatively constant. The elimination of silicon atoms during plasma etching was reduced with increasing nitrogen content because the content of the nitrogen was constant. And besides, the concentration of oxygen was very low on the plasma etched surface. From the study, the plasma etching resistance of the glasses may be improved by the generation of nitrogen related structural groups and those are proved by chemical composition analysis at plasma etched surface of the YSiAlON oxynitride glasses.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.106-111
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• 2001

The freestanding GaN substrates were grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) on (0001) sapphire substrate and prepared by using laser induced lift-off. After a mechanical polishing on both Ga and N-surfaces of GaN films with 100$\mu\textrm{m}$ thick, their polarities have been investigated by using chemical etching in phosphoric acid solution, 3 dimensional surface profiler and Auger electron spectroscopy (AES). The composition of the GaN film measured by AES indicted that Ga and N terminated surfaces have the different N/Ga peak ratio of 0.74 and 0.97, respectively. Ga-face and N-face of GaN revealed quite different chemical properties: the polar surfaces corresponding to (0001) plane are resistant to a phosphoric acid etching whereas N-polar surfaces corresponding to(0001) are chemically active.