Reactive Ion Etching of $Y_{2}O_{3}$ films applying F-, Cl- and Cl/Br-based Inductively Coupled Plasmas

Bradley, J.D.B. and Ay, F. and Wörhoff, K. and Pollnau, M. (2006) Reactive Ion Etching of $Y_{2}O_{3}$ films applying F-, Cl- and Cl/Br-based Inductively Coupled Plasmas. In: Science and Technology of Dielectrics for Active and Passive Photonic Devices, 29 Oct - 3 Nov 2006, Cancun, Mexico.

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Abstract:	Reactive ion etching of yttrium oxide thin films was investigated using $CF_{4}/O_{2}, BCl_{3}, HBr$ and $Cl_{2}$ inductively coupled plasmas. For all gas combinations, with the exception of $Cl_{2}$ , the etch rate was found to be similar, indicating a primarily physical etch process, enhanced in $Cl_{2}$ by an additional chemical-etching component. The highest observed etch rate was 53 nm/min in $Cl_{2}$ , suitable for controlled etching of optical ridge waveguide structures several hundred nm in height. Overall, the surface quality of the etched $Y_{2}O_{3}$ films was the highest after etching in $CF_{4}/O_{2}$ plasmas, indicating a trade-off in etch rate and film quality between the various process gases. Preliminary selectivity measurements show that Ni is a suitable material for etch-masking of high resolution structures in $Y_{2}O_{3}$ .
Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item
Faculty:	Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science (EEMCS)
Research Group:	Integrated Optical MicroSystems (IOMS)
Link to this item:	http://purl.utwente.nl/publications/66567
Official URL:	http://dx.doi.org/10.1149/1.2392925
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Reactive Ion Etching of films applying F-, Cl- and Cl/Br-based Inductively Coupled Plasmas

Reactive Ion Etching of $Y_{2}O_{3}$ films applying F-, Cl- and Cl/Br-based Inductively Coupled Plasmas