SILICON SUBSTRATE | WAFER FABRICATION

GERRY L. PRADO
What is a SILICON WAFER?
 SILICON WAFER
The base material for the manufacturing process comes in the form of a
single-crystalline, lightly doped wafer.
HOW wafers are created?
SILICON WAFER
FABRICATION
PROCESS
WHY Silicon?
 SILICON AS BASE MATERIAL

There are three general

materials which can be used as
base material for a wafer
• Germanium
• Gallium Arsenide
• Silicon
 GERMANIUM AND GALLIUM
• Gallium Arsenide have a high density of crystal defects which limit the
performance of devices made from it
• Compound semiconductors, such as GaAs (in contrast to elemental
semiconductors such as Si and Ge) are much more difficult to grow in
single crystal form
• Germanium supply is not that sufficient to supply the demand of
semiconductor material all over the world
 SILICON AS BASE MATERIAL

Aside from silicon:

• is the 7th most abundant element in the universe
• is the 2nd most abundant element on the planet, after oxygen
• makes about 25% of the Earth’s crust
Silicon:
• Abundancy in the form of sand
• Possibility to form a superior stable oxide (SiO2)
• Silicon do not suffer, in the processing steps, from possible
decomposition
MANUFACTURING process
Silicon FABRICATION
 SAND | QUARTZ
Sand contains many tiny grains of QUARTZ.
QUARTZ or SILICA consists of Silicon Dioxide.
 SAND | QUARTZ
Purification processes vary according to the use intended for the silicon, from
glass to ultra pure silicon used for solid-state devices in electronics.
 POLYCRYSTALLINE SILICON
Silicon can be artificially produced by combining Silica and Carbon in electric
furnace.
 POLYCRYSTALLINE SILICON
The sand (quartz) is heated to about 1600 degrees C – just above its melting
point. The extracted polycrystalline silicon will be prepared for the next process.
CRYSTAL GROWTH
 POLYCRYSTALLINE SILICON MELTING
The melt is held at a temperature of 1690K, which is slightly greater than the
melting point (1685K) of silicon.
 THE CZOCHRALSKI
PROCESS
A precisely controlled quantity of the
dopant is added to the melt.

The ratio of the concentration of

impurities in the solid, Co to that in the
liquid, Ct, is known as the equilibrium
segregation coefficient ko.
ko= Co/Cl
 THE CZOCHRALSKI PROCESS
To grow crystals, one starts with very pure semiconductor grade silicon, which is
melted in a quartz-lined graphite crucible.
 SEED CRYSTAL

A pure silicon seed (a small highly

perfect crystal) attached to a holder
and possessing the desired crystal
orientation, is dipped into the melt
and a small portion is allowed to melt.

The seed is pulled out slowly as it is

rotated. The result is a pure silicon
cylinder: an ingot.
THE MELTING MACHINE
 SILICON CRYSTAL
A cylindrical silicon ingot is typically
about 1 to 2m in length and 200 to
300mm in diameter.

The ingot can be sliced into hundreds

of smaller circular pieces or disk
called wafers.

Each wafer yields hundreds or

thousands of integrated circuits
Silicon wafer FABRICATION
 INGOT SLICING

A precision slicing machine (diamond-

tipped saw or wire saw) produce
wafers that are perfectly flat and as
smooth as possible, with no damage
to the crystal structure.
 LAPPING, ETCHING, AND POLISHING
Lapping removes damaged wafers while etching removes any remaining crystal
damage. Lastly, polishing smoothens uneven surfaces left by slicing.
 FINISHED SILICON WAFER
The wafer diameter varies from 10 to 30cm.
The wafers should be ULTRA CLEAN AND FLAWLESS.
THANK YOU AND GOD BLESS 