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Application Note
Published by
March Plasma Systems
www.marchplasma.com
© 2000 March Plasma Systems, Inc.
INTRODUCTION sense, is defined as a chemical’s propensity
to react with one substance rather than
Over the past thirty years, plasma, the fourth another. In plasma, this is extremely useful
state of matter, has become a very useful characteristic. It provides the opportunity to
means of removing small quantities of tailor the plasma etching process to the
material from a variety of substrates quickly substance of interest and not cause
and efficiently. Plasma processes have been unwanted etching to other substances which
used in many highly sensitive integrated can be in close proximity.
circuit packaging and optoelectronic
applications to precisely remove specific Reactive Ion Etching (RIE) is a type of
materials from sample surfaces. The theory chemical plasma. It is characterized not
of chemical etch plasmas, some typical only by the parameters and characteristics
advanced technology applications, and how mentioned above, but also RIE is extremely
to control the plasma etch process for these directional and anisotropic. It has many
applications will be discussed. applications, this Application Note discusses
applications specific to semiconductor and
THE CHEMICAL PLASMA optoelectronic processing and packaging.
Below is a chart for selecting the proper process gases for etching process recipe development.
Polyimide O2 100%
O2 + CF4 80% + 20%
Polyuethane O2 100%
O2 + CF4 80% + 20%
Single Crystal CF4 100%
Silicon CF4 + O2 (80 - 92%) +(20 - 8%)
SF6 100%
SF6 + O2 (80 - 90%) + (20 - 10%)