Abstract
Surface passivation of high-resistivity silicon (HRS) by amorphous silicon thin-film deposition is demonstrated as a novel technique for establishing HRS as a microwave substrate. Metal-oxide-silicon (MOS) capacitor measurements are used to characterize the silicon surface properties. An increase of the quality factor (Q) of a 10-nH spiral inductor by 40% to Q = 15 and a 6.5-dB lower attenuation of a coplanar wave guide (CPW) at 17 GHz indicate the beneficial effect of the surface passivation for radio frequency (RF) and microwave applications. Regarding CPW attenuation, a nonpassivated 3000-Ω · cm substrate is equivalent to a 70-Ω · cm passivated substrate. Surface-passivated HRS, having minimum losses, a high permittivity, and a high thermal conductivity, qualifies as a close-to-ideal radio frequency and microwave substrate.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 176-178 |
| Number of pages | 3 |
| Journal | IEEE electron device letters |
| Volume | 25 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Apr 2004 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- Attenuation
- Conductivity
- Coplanar waveguides
- Dielectric losses
- Eddy currents
- Excimer lasers
- HF receivers
- HF transmitters
- High-frequency (HF) measurements
- Inductors
- Integrated circuit doping
- Loss measurement
- Losses
- Lossless circuits
- Magnetic fields
- Microwave circuits
- Microwave technology
- Mobile communication
- Monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs)
- Q factor
- Scattering parameters
- Semiconductor device fabrication
- Semiconductor materials
- Silicon
- Transmission lines