Controlled Microfabrication of High-Aspect-Ratio Structures in Silicon at the Highest Etching Rates: The Role of H₂O₂ in the Anodic Dissolution of Silicon in Acidic Electrolytes

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• 作者：Chiara Cozzi ; Giovanni Polito ; Kurt W. Kolasinski and Giuseppe Barillaro
• 刊名：Advanced Functional Materials
• 出版年：2017
• 出版时间：February 10, 2017
• 年：2017
• 卷：27
• 期：6
• 全文大小：1809K
• ISSN：1616-3028

文摘

In this work the authors report on the controlled electrochemical etching of high-aspect-ratio (from 5 to 100) structures in silicon at the highest etching rates (from 3 to 10 µm min⁻¹) at room temperature. This allows silicon microfabrication entering a previously unattainable region where etching of high-aspect-ratio structures (beyond 10) at high etching rate (over 3 µm min⁻¹) was prohibited for both commercial and research technologies. Addition of an oxidant, namely H₂O₂, to a standard aqueous hydrofluoric (HF) acid electrolyte is used to dramatically change the stoichiometry of the silicon dissolution process under anodic biasing without loss of etching control accuracy at the higher depths (up to 200 µm). The authors show that the presence of H₂O₂ reduces the valence of the dissolution process to 1, thus rendering the electrochemical etching more effective, and catalyzes the etching rate by opening a more efficient path for silicon dissolution with respect to the well-known Gerischer mechanism, thus increasing the etching speed at both shorter and higher depths.