• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.289.1-289.1
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• 2016

Germanium (Ge) with higher carrier mobility and a lower crystallization temperature has been considered as the channel material of thin-film transistors for display applications. Various methods were studied for crystallizaion of poly-Ge from amorphous Ge at low temperature. Especially Metal induced crystalliazation (MIC) process was widely studied because low process cost. In this paper, we investigate copper diffusion process of different thick (70 nm, 350 nm) poly-Ge film obtained by MIC process at various temperatures (250, 300, and $350^{\circ}C$) through atomic force microscopy (AFM), Raman spectroscopy, and secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) measurement. Crystallization completeness and grain size was similar in all the conditions. Copper diffusion profile of 370 nm poly-Ge film show simirly results regardless of process temperature. However, copper diffusion profile of 70 nm poly-Ge film show different results by process temperature.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.9 no.6
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• pp.276-280
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• 2010

Copper(Cu) as an interconnecting metal layer can replace aluminum (Al) in IC fabrication since Cu has low electrical resistivity, showing high immunity to electromigration compared to Al. However, it is very difficult for copper to be patterned by the dry etching processes. The chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process has been introduced and widely used as the mainstream patterning technique for Cu in the fabrication of deep submicron integrated circuits in light of its capability to reduce surface roughness. But this process leaves a large amount of residues on the wafer surface, which must be removed by the post-CMP cleaning processes. Copper corrosion is one of the critical issues for the copper metallization process. Thus, in order to understand the copper corrosion problems in post-CMP cleaning solutions and study the effects of DC biases and post-CMP cleaning solution concentrations on the Cu film, a constant voltage was supplied at various concentrations, and then the output currents were measured and recorded with time. Most of the cases, the current was steadily decreased (i.e. resistance was increased by the oxidation). In the lowest concentration case only, the current was steadily increased with the scarce fluctuations. The higher the constant supplied DC voltage values, the higher the initial output current and the saturated current values. However the time to be taken for it to be saturated was almost the same for all the DC supplied voltage values. It was indicated that the oxide formation was not dependent on the supplied voltage values and 1 V was more than enough to form the oxide. With applied voltages lower than 3 V combined with any concentration, the perforation through the oxide film rarely took place due to the insufficient driving force (voltage) and the copper oxidation ceased. However, with the voltage higher than 3 V, the copper ions were started to diffuse out through the oxide film and thus made pores to be formed on the oxide surface, causing the current to increase and a part of the exposed copper film inside the pores gets back to be oxidized and the rest of it was remained without any further oxidation, causing the current back to decrease a little bit. With increasing the applied DC bias value, the shorter time to be taken for copper ions to be diffused out through the copper oxide film. From the discussions above, it could be concluded that the oxide film was formed and grown by the copper ion diffusion first and then the reaction with any oxidant in the post-CMP cleaning solution.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.6-14
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• 2014

Copper metal is widely used in tubes installed in sprinkler water services because of its excellent corrosion resistance. Copper corrosion is considered to be insignificant in water system and the incident of copper pipeline failure is relatively low. However, pitting corrosion is a major problem with all copper tubes. In this study, leaked sprinkler copper tubes were collected from three different locations and examined on the causes of pitting corrosion of copper tubes in sprinkler water plumbing systems. Electrochemical tests such as potentiodynamic polarization, as well as surface and chemical analyses were performed. Results show that pitting corrosion of copper tubes were found as Type I pitting that the carbon film formed on the copper tubes have a harmful effects, causing the pinhole failure in the pipe and resulting in leakage of water. The contermeasures on Type I pitting corrosion of copper tubes were proposed.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.198-205
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• 2007

The initial stages of electrochemical oxidative CuI film formation on Cu(111), as studied by means of Cyclic Voltammetry (CV), in-situ Scanning Tunneling Microscopy (STM) and ex-situ Synchrotron X-ray Photoemission Spectroscopy (SXPS), indicate a significant acceleration of copper oxidation in the presence of iodide anions in the electrolyte. A surface confined supersaturation with mobile CuI monomers first leads to the formation of a 2D-CuI film via nucleation and growth of a Cu/I-bilayer on-top of a pre-adsorbed iodide monolayer. Structurally, this 2D-CuI film is closely related to the (111) plane of crystalline CuI (zinc blende type). Interestingly, this film causes no significant passivation of the copper surface. In an advanced stage of copper dissolution a transition from the 2D- to a 3D-CuI growth mode can be observed.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.39 no.5
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• pp.215-222
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• 2006

The passivity behavior of copper anode containing impurities in copper sulfate solution for electrorefining process was studied at several different levels of impurities such as As, Sb, Bi and Pb. The passivity behavior was investigated by electrochemical techniques (galvanostatic, potentiodynamic and cyclic voltammetry tests) and surface analysis (optical microscopy, electron probe microanalysis, scanning electron microscopy). The results were that arsenic, antimony inhibited passivation and bismuth accelerated it and lead containing anode showed different passivity behavior from above anodes. The improved passivity characteristics could be explained by decrease in oxygen content in passivity film which resulted from a reaction among the impurities, oxygen and copper in the anode. The SEM image revealed that arsenic or antimony containing anode exhibited a porous passivity film and bismuth containing anode showed the compact passivity film and lead containing anode had loose passivity film on anode.

• Journal of Adhesion and Interface
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.15-27
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• 2007

Polyimide (PI) surface modification was carried out by ion-beam treatment and silane-imidazole coupling agent to improve the adhesion between polyimide film and copper. Silane-imidazole coupling agent contains imidazole functional groups for the formation of a complex with copper metal through a coordination bonding and methoxy silane groups for the formation of siloxane polymers. The PI film surface was first treated by argon (Ar)/oxygen ($O_2$) ion-beam, followed by dipping it into a modified silane-imidazole coupling agent solution. The results of X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) spectra revealed that the $Ar/O_2$ plasma treatment formed oxygen functional groups such as hydroxyl and carbonyl groups on the polyimide film surface and confirmed that the PI surface was modified by a coupling reaction with imidazole-silane coupling agent. Adhesion between copper and the treated PI film by ion-beam and coupling agent was superior to that with untreated PI film. In addition, adhesion of PI film treated by an $Ar/O_2$ plasma to copper was better than that of PI film treated by a coupling agent. The peeled-off layers from the copper-PI film joint were completely different in chemical composition each other. The layer of PI film side showed similar C1s, N1s, O1s spectra to the original Upilex-S and no Si and Cu atoms appeared. On the other hand the layer of copper side showed different C1s and N1s spectra from the original PI film and many Si and Cu atoms appeared. This indicates that the failure occurs at an interface between the imidazole-silane and PI film layers rather than within the PI layers.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.173-178
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• 2004

Silicon thin film were synthesized from silane and argon gas mixture directly on copper foil by rf PECVD and then lithium ion batteries were prepared from them employed as the negative electrodes without any further treatment. In the present study, two different kinds of silicon thin films, amorphous silicon and copper silicide were prepared by changing deposition temperature. Amorphous silicon film was prepared below $200^{\circ}C$, but copper silicide film with granular shape was formed by the reaction between silicon radical and diffused copper ions under elevating temperature above $400^{\circ}C$. The amorphous silicon film gives higher capacity than copper silicide, but the capacity decreases sharply with charge-discharge cycling. This is possibly due to severe volume changes. The cyclability is improved, however, by employing the copper silicide as a negative electrode. The copper silicide plays an important role as an active material of the electrode, which mitigates volume change cause by the existence of silicon and copper chemical bonding and provides low electrical resistance as well.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.147-150
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• 2014

Copper ink has been prepared by mixing copper(II) formate and 2-ethyl-1-hexylammonium bicarbonate (EHABC) to overcome some weak points such as aggregation and degradation of copper nano-type ink. Ink was coated on glass substrate and calcined at $110^{\circ}C$ to $150^{\circ}C$ to generate electrically conductive copper film under two different atmospheres such as nitrogen gas and gaseous mixture of formic acid and methanol. The lowest resistivity of $1.88{\mu}{\Omega}{\cdot}cm$ of copper film was obtained at $150^{\circ}C$ in gaseous formic acid condition. The long-term resistivity shows to increase from $1.88{\mu}{\Omega}{\cdot}cm$ to $2.61{\mu}{\Omega}{\cdot}cm$ after one month.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.174-179
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• 2003

Thin copper films were grown by electrodeposition on copper seed layers which were grown by sputtering of an ultra-pure copper target on tantalum nitride-coated silicon wafers and subsequently, cleaned in ECR plasma. The copper films were then subjected to ⅰ) vacuum annealing, ⅱ) rapid thermal annealing (RTA) and ⅲ) rapid thermal nitriding (RTN) at various temperatures over different periods of time. XRD, SEM, AFM and resistivity measurements were done to ascertain the optimum heat treatment condition for obtaining film with minimum resistivity, predominantly (111)-oriented and smoother surface morphology. The as-deposited film has a resistivity of ∼6.3 $\mu$$\Omega$-cm and a relatively small intensity ratio of (111) and (200) peaks. With heat treatment, the resistivity decreases and the (111) peak becomes dominant, along with improved smoothness of the copper film. The optimum condition (with a resistivity of 1.98 $\mu$$\Omega$-cm) is suggested as the rapid thermal nitriding at 400oC for 120 sec.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.218-224
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• 2010

Direct copper electroplating on Mg alloy AZ31B was carried out in a traditional pyrophosphate copper bath containing potassium fluoride. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and polarization methods were used to study the effects of added potassium fluoride on electrochemical behavior. The chemical state of magnesium alloy in the electroplating bath was analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Adhesion of the copper electroplated layer was also tested. Due to the added potassium fluoride, a magnesium fluoride film was formed in the pyrophosphate copper bath. This fluoride film inhibits dissolution of Mg alloy and enables to electroplate copper directly on it. A dense copper layer was formed on the Mg alloy. Moreover, this copper layer has a good adhesion with Mg alloy substrate.