Thin film silicon MEMS microresonators fabricated by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition

Patil, S. B. , Adrega, T., Chu, V. and Conde, J.P. (2006) Thin film silicon MEMS microresonators fabricated by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition. Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering, 16(12), pp. 2730-2735. (doi: 10.1088/0960-1317/16/12/028)

Abstract

Thin film silicon MEMS electrostatic microresonators are fabricated on glass substrates by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition with the silicon structural layer spanning the amorphous-to-nanocrystalline transition. The amorphous-to-nanocrystalline transition is induced by increasing the hydrogen dilution of the reaction gases during the thin film silicon deposition. All processing steps are carried out at temperatures ≤110 °C. Hot-wire deposition allows significantly faster deposition rates of thin-silicon films than standard RF plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition. In addition, the lower stress present in hot-wire films due to the absence of ion bombardment during growth allows the fabrication of thin film nanocrystalline silicon microresonators. The microresonators are electrostatically actuated and the resulting deflection is measured optically. The crystallinity of the structural layer does not have an observable effect in the rigidity of the resonators. The quality factor of the resonators shows a maximum at 85% H2 dilution, corresponding to a material with a structure intermediate between amorphous and nanocrystalline. A sharp decrease in quality factors is observed for higher dilutions which correspond to nanocrystalline silicon films.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Patil, Dr Samadhan
• Authors: Patil, S. B., Adrega, T., Chu, V., and Conde, J.P.
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering > Electronics and Nanoscale Engineering
• Journal Name: Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering
• Publisher: IOP Publishing Ltd.
• ISSN: 0960-1317
• ISSN (Online): 1361-6439
• Published Online: 17 November 2006