1894
24, DECEMBER 15, 2009
Deep-UV Technology for the Fabrication of Bragg
Gratings on SOI Rib Waveguides
Ivano Giuntoni, David Stolarek, Harald Richter, Steffen Marschmeyer, Joachim Bauer, Andrzej Gajda,
Jürgen Bruns, Bernd Tillack, Klaus Petermann, and Lars Zimmermann
Abstract—In this letter, we present a wafer level technology
based on deep-ultraviolet lithography to fabricate Bragg gratings
on silicon-on-insulator rib waveguides. The principle of the used
double-patterning technique is presented, as well the influence of
the process variation on the device performances. The fabricated
Bragg gratings were characterized and compared to analogue
structures patterned with electron-beam lithography.
Index Terms—Bragg scattering, gratings, rib waveguides, sil-
icon-on-insulator technology, waveguide filters.
I. INTRODUCTION
B RAGG gratings have been established in the last years
as an important waveguide component for achieving
wavelength selective filter functions. Fiber-based Bragg grating
structures can be considered state of the art for applications in
the optical communications and for sensing. The reliable inte-
gration of such a component on the silicon-on-insulator (SOI)
platform is hence an important step for the further development
of silicon-based integrated systems for wavelength selection
and dispersion compensation. However, the transition from
silica-based Bragg gratings to silicon waveguide gratings is
less obvious than it seems.
In first-order gratings, the period is given by the Bragg
condition
(1)
where is the reflected wavelength and the effective index
seen by the fundamental waveguide mode. At telecommunica-
tion wavelengths around 1.55 m, silicon exhibits a refractive
index around 3.5, hence a grating period around 225 nm is re-
quired. That is about the resolution limit of most conventional
lithography techniques. Furthermore, many applications require
a very narrow reflection bandwidth and low propagation loss
Manuscript received September 04, 2009; revised October 07, 2009. First
published November 06, 2009; current version published December 03, 2009.
This work was financially supported by the German Research Foundation
(DFG) in the frame of grant FOR653.
I. Giuntoni, A. Gajda, J. Bruns, and K. Petermann are with
the Technische Universität Berlin, D-10587 Berlin, Germany
(e-mail: ivano.giuntoni@tu-berlin.de; andrzej.gajda@tu-berlin.de;
juergen.bruns@tu-berlin.de; petermann@tu-berlin.de).
D. Stolarek, H. Richter, S. Marschmeyer, J. Bauer, and B. Tillack are
with IHP GmbH, 15236 Frankfurt (Oder), Germany (e-mail: stolarek@ihp-
microelectronics.com; hhrichter@ihp-microelectronics.com; hhrichter@ihp-
microelectronics.com; bauer@ihp-microelectronics.com; tillack@ihp-
microelectronics.com).
L. Zimmermann is with the Technische Universität Berlin, D-10587 Berlin,
Germany. He is also with IHP GmbH, 15236 Frankfurt (Oder), Germany
(e-mail: lzimmermann@ihp-microelectronics.com).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this letter are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LPT.2009.2035096
1041-1135/$26.00 © 2009 IEEE
Authorized licensed use limited to: National Chiao Tung Univ.. Downloaded on November 06,2020 at 15:06:53 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 21, NO.
for the transmitted wavelengths. This can be achieved only by
keeping the grating depth very shallow, in the order of tens of
nanometers, and increasing the overall component length, even
in millimeter range [1]. The fabrication of such gratings is not
obvious.
So far, electron-beam lithography (EBL) has been used to
achieve state-of-the-art performance [2]–[4]. EBL can achieve
very high resolution, but only within a limited writing field (usu-
ally less than 1 mm ). Writing fields can be stitched together
to achieve bigger structures, but only at the price of additional
stitching errors. The speed of high precision e-beam writing also
renders the technique incompatible with wafer level processing.
In this work, we have investigated an alternative approach to
the fabrication of Bragg gratings, using deep-ultraviolet (DUV)
248-nm lithography. DUV lithography is a planar technology
and is of widespread use in modern microelectronics fabrica-
tion. Therefore, our approach warrants the possibility for high
throughput and thus low-cost fabrication of silicon waveguide
Bragg gratings.
II. DOUBLE PATTERN PRINCIPLE
In the case of 248-nm DUV exposure, the definition of pe-
riodic patterns with a pitch below 130 nm requires the use of
half-pitch double-exposure lithography (DEL) or double-pat-
terning lithography (DPL) techniques due to diffraction and res-
olution limits. The principle of these techniques is to divide the
layout in two parts to have a more relaxed half-pitch for the pho-
tolithography. Due to the layout splitting, it is possible to reduce
the minimum half-pitch of the exposure tool without changing
the exposure wavelength. Both techniques are widely known
and in use in modern lithography for microelectronics fabrica-
tion to achieve smaller pitches [5]. In our work, we opted for
double patterning due to previous experience gained with this
technique [6]. The principle of the DPL technique is shown in
Fig. 1.
DPL uses a hard mask for pattern transfer. After exposure
and development of the first part (level 1) of the split layout
(which has double the pitch of the desired layout), the pattern
is transferred to the underlying hard mask. The second part of
the split layout (level 2) is then exposed, developed, and etched,
shifted by the pitch of the original layout. Hence, we obtain a
pattern with the pitch of the original unsplit layout.
III. PATTERNING ERROR ANALYSIS
The presented double-patterning technique is susceptible to
process variations. The overlay error is one of the major prob-
lems and consists of the undesired misalignment between pat-
tern level 1 and level 2. Fig. 2 illustrates the overlay error.
The overlay error splits the original Bragg grating in two sub-
gratings with different duty cycles (ratio between the grating
opening and the period). The error should, therefore, have an
GIUNTONI et al.: DUV TECHNOLOGY FOR THE FABRICATION OF BRAGG GRATINGS ON SOI RIB WAVEGUIDES
Fig. 1. Process flow for the DPL technique.
Fig. 2. DPL process flow with introduction of an overlay error (shift to the left).
The error is exaggerated for illustrative purposes.
Fig. 3. Dependence of the reflectivity maximum on the overlay error. A grating
with a period 3 = 225 nm and an etching depth d = 50 nm was considered.
influence on the grating efficiency. To achieve a first, semiquan-
titative impression of the effect of the overlay error, we have in-
vestigated its impact on the efficiency of the Bragg grating using
a two-dimensional bidirectional eigenmode expansion (BEP)
[7], [8]. In Fig. 3, the dependence of the reflection peak on the
overlay error is depicted. The overlay error impacts strongly on
the grating efficiency, with a more pronounced effect on the TE
polarization, since the optical field for the TM polarization has
a weaker interaction with the grating region and is hence less
affected by the overlay error. Since reduced efficiency and po-
larization dependence are undesirable for most applications, a
minimization of the overlay error is hence mandatory for the
application of DPL in Bragg grating fabrication. A first estima-
tion of the alignment tolerance because of the overlay error can
be derived from Fig. 3 about 10 nm.
Other errors are related to variations of the profiles of the
spaces between etch 1 and etch 2 (i.e., control of critical dimen-
sions, cd). So far, we have not analyzed such errors systemati-
cally.
IV. FABRICATION
Our waveguides are 1.4- m SOI rib waveguides on 1- m
buried oxide. The dimensions were chosen to realize waveg-
uides with low intrinsic loss that allow the implementation of
Authorized licensed use limited to: National Chiao Tung Univ.. Downloaded on November 06,2020 at 15:06:53 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
1895
Fig. 4. Top view SEM image of a rib waveguide with Bragg grating fabricated
in DPL technology. The residual slab grating has been shifted intentionally to
one side of the rib.
waveguide Bragg gratings with a length of the order of centime-
ters. Typical rib parameters are 1.7- m rib width and 0.5- m
rib depth, which assures single-mode operation of both polar-
izations.
To realize Bragg grating structures on these waveguides, the
grating spaces were fabricated first using the double-patterning
technique (numerical aperture 0.82). After dry-etching the
grating (50-nm depth), the waveguide ribs were formed by a
third etch step (500-nm depth). In both dry etch steps a poly-Si
decoupled plasma source (DPS) etch chamber (Applied Mate-
rials) was used, which warrants an etch depth variation lower
than 10% on a 200-mm substrate. For the Bragg grating etch
a simple one-step process using CF –Ar chemistry guarantees
a uniform hard mask opening and a subsequent etching into
underlying silicon to realize 50-nm-deep grating trenches. In
view of future integration aspects with other optical and elec-
tronic devices, the final etch process for waveguide definition
was based on a well proven dry etch recipe used for shallow
trench etching in 0.13- m technology. The multistep process
starts with the etching of the antireflective coating layer, fol-
lowed by the opening of the hard mask, consisting of a stack of
different oxide and nitride layers. After in situ ashing, the wave-
guide etching is carried out in chlorine-based plasma. An image
of a waveguide with Bragg grating is shown in Fig. 4. In our first
mask set, there was a slight overlap of the grating spaces with
the slab region to accommodate alignment tolerances as known
from contact lithography.
The residual grating pattern in the slab is visible in Fig. 4.
However, we soon realized that the alignment tolerances of the
DUV exposure tool (NIKON NSR207D, overlay accuracy
10 nm) did not necessitate such dimensions, so that in future
runs we shall deploy spaces exactly matched to the waveguides.
The possibility for that has been tested with an intentional shift
of the spaces and alignment with the waveguide edge.
A side-view of a waveguide with grating spaces (left-hand
side of Fig. 5) reveals some surface roughness at the bottom of
the spaces. That is to be expected from the dry-etch process. The
sidewall of the rib is not affected by the grating definition.
From the cross section of a waveguide Bragg grating (right-
hand side of Fig. 5) it can be observed that the profile is not
perfectly rectangular, and a small overlay error is visible.
1896
Fig. 5. Sideview and cross section of the grating pattern.
Fig. 6. Transmission spectra of two Bragg gratings on SOI rib waveguides pat-
terned with DUV and EB lithography, respectively. The DUV patterned gating is
50-nm-deep etched, the EBL one 80 nm. Both devices exhibit an overall length
of 800 m. TE polarization was considered.
V. MEASUREMENT RESULTS
An optical characterization of the fabricated devices was
performed, to permit to judge the quality of the grating per-
formance. The results were compared to the ones obtained
from gratings with a similar geometry patterned with EBL [9].
The measurement setup used for the characterization consists
on a transmission measurement setup, where the single-pass
transmission through the silicon waveguide is measured. The
analysis of the spectral behavior of the gratings was performed
with a tunable laser source while a polarization controller
allowed setting the polarization of the propagating light. An
efficient in- and out-coupling was achieved using lensed fibers,
and facets were covered with an antireflection coating to avoid
undesired resonances. The grating transmissivity was calcu-
lated as the ratio between the power transmitted by a waveguide
with grating, and the one measured from a common waveguide,
isolating the grating performance from the waveguide charac-
teristics.
Fig. 6 shows the measured transmission curves (TE polariza-
tion) for two gratings patterned with the presented DUV tech-
nology and with EBL, respectively. One can easily observe that
the two curves are in good agreement with each other, exhibiting
a strong dip around 1550 nm over a bandwidth of 0.7 nm.
At other wavelengths, the loss introduced from the gratings is
around 0.3 dB.
At shorter wavelengths, around 1525 nm, a broad drop in the
transmission spectrum is present, corresponding to a coupling
to backward higher order modes, as theoretically expected [1].
The higher extinction ratio of the EBL-patterned grating can be
explained by its slightly deeper etch (80 nm). No wavelength-
dependent filtering effect was observed for the TM polarization.
Authorized licensed use limited to: National Chiao Tung Univ.. Downloaded on November 06,2020 at 15:06:53 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 21, NO. 24, DECEMBER 15, 2009
Fig. 7. Dependence of the introduced loss and of the reflectivity peak on the
grating length.
The influence of the grating length on the grating perfor-
mances was also investigated. As shown on Fig. 7, longer de-
vices exhibit a larger reflectivity, which saturates around 90%
for gratings longer than 1 mm. The introduced loss also in-
creases, remaining however below 0.5 dB. This value is ex-
pected to increase reducing the size of the waveguides, since
scattering effects due to the surface modulation would be en-
hanced [10].
VI. CONCLUSION
DUV lithography (248 nm) and the double-patterning
technique for the fabrication of Bragg gratings on SOI rib
waveguides were studied theoretically and experimentally.
The influence of the overlay error was identified as a possibly
limiting factor for the application of this technique. Usable
structures were realized, exhibiting a small overlay error and
nonrectangular grating profile. The optical characterization
showed that the presented technique is capable to provide
gratings with performance comparable to the state of the art
gratings patterned with EBL.
REFERENCES
[1] I. Giuntoni et al., “Numerical survey on Bragg reflectors in sil-
icon-on-insulator waveguides,” in IEEE/LEOS Group IV Photonics
Conf. (GFP2008), Sorrento, Italy, Sep. 2008, pp. 285–287.
[2] T. E. Murphy, J. T. Hastings, and H. I. Smith, “Fabrication and charac-
terization of narrowband Bragg reflection filters in silicon-on-insulator
ridge waveguides,” J. Lightw. Technol., vol. 19, no. 12, pp. 1938–1942,
Dec. 2001.
[3] P. Heimala et al., “Fabrication of Bragg grating structures in silicon,”
Phys. Scr., vol. T101, pp. 92–95, 2002.
[4] S. Honda et al., “Largely-tunable wideband Bragg gratings fabricated
on SOI rib waveguides employed by deep-RIE,” Electron. Lett., vol.
43, no. 11, pp. 630–631, May 24, 2007.
[5] G. Capetti et al., “Sub-k 1 = 0.25 lithography with double patterning
technique for 45-nm technology node flash memory devices at  =
193 nm,” Proc. SPIE, vol. 6520, 2007, Paper 65202K.
[6] S. Geisler et al., “100 nm half – pitch double exposure KrF lithography
using binary masks,” Proc. SPIE, vol. 6924, 2008, Paper 69241Z.
[7] J. Čtyroký, S. Helfert, and R. Pregla, “Analysis of a deep waveguide
Bragg grating,” Opt. Quantum Electron., vol. 30, pp. 343–358, 1998.
[8] J. Čtyroký et al., “Bragg waveguide grating as a 1-D photonic bandgap
structure: COST 268 modelling task,” Opt. Quantum Electron., vol. 34,
pp. 455–470, 2002.
[9] I. Giuntoni et al., “Tunable Bragg reflectors on silicon-on-insulator rib
waveguides,” Opt. Express, vol. 17, pp. 18518–18524, 2009.
[10] F. Grillot, L. Vivien, S. Laval, and E. Cassan, “Propagation loss in
single-mode ultrasmall square silicon-on-insulator optical waveg-
uides,” J. Lightw. Technol., vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 891–896, Feb. 2006.