• ETRI Journal
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.211-220
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• 2002

This study characterizes an oxide etching process in a magnetically enhanced reactive ion etching (MERIE) reactor with a $CHF_3/CF_4$ gas chemistry. We use a statistical $2^{4-1}$ experimental design plus one center point to characterize the relationships between the process factors and etch responses. The factors that we varied in the design include RF power, pressure, and gas composition, and the modeled etch responses were the etch rate, etch selectivity to TiN, and uniformity. The developed models produced 3D response plots. Etching of $SiO_2$ mainly depends on F density and ion bombardment. $SiO_2$ etch selectivity to TiN sensitively depends on the F density in the plasma and the effects of ion bombardment. The process conditions for a high etch selectivity are a 0.3 to 0.5 $CF_4$ flow ratio and a -600 V to -650 V DC bias voltage according to the process pressure in our experiment. Etching uniformity was improved with an increase in the $CF_4$ flow ratio in the gas mixture, an increase in the source power, and a higher pressure. Our characterization of via etching in a $CHF_3/CF_4$ MERIE using neural networks was successful, economical, and effective. The results provide highly valuable information about etching mechanisms and optimum etching conditions.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.10-16
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• 2001

Recently plasma etching research has been focused on the metal surfaces in the nuclear industry. In this study, surface etching reaction of metallic Co and Mo, principal contaminants in the spent nuclear components, in CF$_4$/O$_2$, gas plasma has been experimentally investigated to look into the applicability and the effectiveness of the technique for the surface decontamination. Experimental variables are $CF_4$/$O_2$ ratio and substrate temperature between 29$0^{\circ}C$ and 38$0^{\circ}C$. Experimental results Show that the optimum gas composition is 80%CF$_4$-20%$O_2$ and the metallic Co and Mo are etched out well enough in the temperatures range. Cobalt starts to be etched above $350^{\circ}C$ and the etching rate increases with increasing substrate temperature. Maximum rate achieved at 38$0^{\circ}C$ under 220 W r.f. plasma power is 0.06 $\mu\textrm{m}$/min. On the other hand, the metallic Mo is etched easily even at low temperature and the reaction rate drastically increases as the substrate temperature goes up. Highest rate obtained under the same conditions is $1.9\mu\textrm{m}$/min. OES (Optical Emission Spectroscopy) analysis reveals that the intensities of F atom and CO molecule reach maximum at the optimum gas composition, which demonstrates that the principal reaction mechanism is fluorination and/or carbonyl reaction. It is confirmed, therefore, that dry processing technique using reactive plasma is quite feasible and applicable for the decontamination of surface-contaminated parts or equipments.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 1992.05b
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• pp.55-56
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• 1992

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 1992.05a
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• pp.59-60
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• 1992

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 1996.11a
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• pp.150-150
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• 1996

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.27.2-27.2
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• 2006

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.416-422
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• 1999

The characteristics of inductively coupled Cl$_2$/BCl$_3$ plasmas during the GaN etching were studied using plasma mass spectrometry by measuring the relative amounts of reactive ions, neutrals, and etch products. GaN etch rates increased with the increase of pressure and showed a maximum near 25mTorr for the pure $Cl_2$ and near 30mTorr for $Cl_2$$BCl_3$. The addition of$ BCl_3$ to $Cl_2$ also was increased GaN etch rates until 50%BCl$_3$ was mixed to $Cl_2$. The GaN etching with pure $Cl Cl_2$ appears to be related to the combination of Cl$_2^{+}$ ion bombardment and the chemical reaction of Cl radicals. In the case of the GaN etching with Cl$_2$/BCl$_3$, in addition to the combined effect of$_2^{ +}$ ions and Cl radicals, $_BCl2^{+ }$ ions appear to be responsible for some of GaN etching even though they do not have significant effect on the GaN etching compared to $Cl_2^{+}$ and Cl. $Ga^{+ }$ , $GaCl^{+}$ , $GaCl_2^{+}$ , and $N_2^{+}$ were observed as the positive ions of etch products, and the intensities of these etch products showed the same trends as those of GaN etch rate. Among the etch products, Ga and $N_2$ appear to be the main etch products.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.17 no.12
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• pp.642-647
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• 2007

We investigated dry etching of acrylic (PMMA) in $O_2/N_2$ plasmas using a multi-layers electrode reactive ion etching (RIE) system. The multi-layers electrode RIE system had an electrode (or a chuck) consisted of 4 individual layers in a series. The diameter of the electrodes was 150 mm. The etch process parameters we studied were both applied RIE chuck power on the electrodes and % $O_2$ composition in the $N_2/O_2$ plasma mixtures. In details, the RIE chuck power was changed from 75 to 200 W.% $O_2$ in the plasmas was varied from 0 to 100% at the fixed total gas flow rates of 20 sccm. The etch results of acrylic in the multilayers electrode RIE system were characterized in terms of negatively induced dc bias on the electrode, etch rates and RMS surface roughness. Etch rate of acrylic was increased more than twice from about $0.2{\mu}m/min$ to over $0.4{\mu}m/min$ when RIE chuck power was changed from 75 to 200 W. 1 sigma uniformity of etch rate variation of acrylic on the 4 layers electrode was slightly increased from 2.3 to 3.2% when RIE chuck power was changed from 75 to 200 W at the fixed etch condition of 16 sccm $O_2/4\;sccm\;N_2$ gas flow and 100 mTorr chamber pressure. Surface morphology was also investigated using both a surface profilometry and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The RMS roughness of etched acrylic surface was strongly affected by % $O_2$ composition in the $O_2/N_2$ plasmas. However, RIE chuck power changes hardly affected the roughness results in the range of 75-200 W. During etching experiment, Optical Emission Spectroscopy (OES) data was taken and we found both $N_2$ peak (354.27 nm) and $O_2$ peak (777.54 nm). The preliminarily overall results showed that the multi-layers electrode concept could be successfully utilized for high volume reactive ion etching of acrylic in the future.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.314-318
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• 2010

We fabricated a plasma texturing for multi-crystalline silicon cells using reactive ion etching (RIE). Multi-crystalline Si cells have not benefited from the cost-effective wet-chemical texturing processes that reduce front surface reflectance on single-crystal wafers. Elimination of plasma damage has been achieved while keeping front reflectance to extremely low levels. We will discuss reflectance, quantum efficiency and conversion efficiency for multi-crystalline Si solar cell by each RIE process conditions.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.8 no.4B
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• pp.541-547
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• 1999

Reactive ion etching process for InP using BCl3/O2/Ar high density inductively coupled plasma was investigated. The experimental design method proposed by the Taguchi was utilized to cover the whole parameter range while maintaining reasonable number of actual experiments. Results showed that the ICP power and the chamber pressure were the two dominant parameters affectsing etch results. It was also observed that the etch rate decreased and the surface roughness improved as the ICP power and the bias voltage increased and as the chamber pressure decreased. The Addition of oxygen to the gas mixture drastically improved surface roughness by suppressing the formation of the surface reaction product. The optimum condition was ICP power 600W, bias voltage -100V, 10% $O_2$, 6mTorr, and $180^{\circ}C$, resulting in about 0.15$\mu\textrm{m}$ etch rate with smooth surfaces and vertical mesa sidewalls Also, the maximum etch rate of abut 4.5 $\mu\textrm{m}$/min was obtained at the condition of ICP power 800W, bias voltage -150V, 15% $O_2$, 8mTorr and $160^{\circ}C$.