Highly selective isotropic dry etch based nanofabrication

Abstract

Metallic nanowires have significant importance in microelectronic circuits [N. A. Melosh et al., Science 300, 112 (2003)], memory cells, optics [X. Wu et al., Nature (London) 430, 61 (2004)], liquid crystal displays [C. Lapointe et al., Science 303, 652 (2004)], and sensors [R. C. Walter et al., Surf. Interface Anal. 34, 409 (2002)]. There are various methods for fabricating patterned nanostructures such as nanowires, but high cost, low throughput, and uniformity are still their major issues [M. Hernandez-Velez, Thin Solid Films 495, 51 (2006)]. Therefore, a simple nanofabrication technique that uses existing microfabrication tool sets and methods to fabricate nanostructures such as nanowires with accuracy and flexibility is required. Here, the authors show use of a historically well-known method [Z. Yu et al., J. Vac. Sci. Technol. B 21, 2089 (2003)] based on overetch triggered undercutting to fabricate thin film nanowires on a silicon wafer. For the first time, batch-fabricated metallic nanowire—titanium nitride (TiN)—on 200mm silicon wafers using highly selective, timed, isotropic dry etch is being reported. Use of conventional microfabrication in the author’s demonstrated technique indicates the simplicity and economy of fabricating nanowires.

Ultimate low-power devices

“…We are also developing advanced nanofabrication technology for controlled integration of 1D nanowires and nanotubes that are compatible with the state-of-the-art CMOS-based platform. 6 With intelligent circuit design and integration of smart, low-power transistors, we expect to develop ultralow to no-power-consumption circuit components.…”