AVS 49th International Symposium
    Processing at the Nanoscale Thursday Sessions
       Session PN+SS-ThM

Paper PN+SS-ThM7
Fabrication of Si Nanostructures by Scanning Probe Oxidation and Tetra-Methyl Ammonium Hydroxide Etching

Thursday, November 7, 2002, 10:20 am, Room C-109

Session: Patterning and Functionalization
Presenter: F.S.-S. Chien, Center for Measurement Standards, Taiwan
Authors: F.S.-S. Chien, Center for Measurement Standards, Taiwan
W.-F. Hsieh, National Chiao-Tung University, Taiwan
S. Gwo, National Tsing-Hua University, Taiwan
A.E. Vladar, National Institute of Standards and Technology
J.A. Dagata, National Institute of Standards and Technology
Correspondent: Click to Email
We demonstrated that the process of scanning probe microscope (SPM) oxidation and anisotropic tetra-methyl ammonium hydroxide (TMAH) etching is a low-cost and reliable method to produce smooth and uniform silicon nanostructures on a variety of silicon substrates. Etched structures with a pitch of 100 nm, positive- and negative-contrast structures, and features height greater than 100 nm have been produced on bare silicon, Si@sub 3@N@sub 4@-coated and silicon-on-insulator wafers. Evolution of hexagonal pits on two-dimensional grid structures were shown to depend on the pattern spacing and orientation with respect to Si(110) crystal directions. We successfully combined SPM oxidation with traditional optical lithography in a mixed, multilevel patterning method for realizing micrometer- and nanometer-scale feature sizes, as required for photonic device designs. The combination of SPM oxidation and TMAH etching is a promising approach to rapid prototyping of functional nano-photonic devices.