Chemistry and Characterisation of Surfaces and Thin Films

Vakinformatie

De lessen thin films wordt gegeven door Prof Stefan De gendt, prof Annelies Delabie en enkele gastsprekers van Imec. In het vak worden verschillende technieken gezien voor het prodeceren en analyseren van geleiders en halfgeleiders. De evaluatie van dit vak staat voor 50% op een paper die geschreven moet worden en een korte presentatie over deze paper die moet gegeven worden tijdens het examen. De andere 50% staat op een openboek examen.

Examenvragen

12 januari 2018

1. There's a difference between the surface preparation of substrates for ALD and epitaxy. Explain why.

2017

1. Lesson 1-2
   • How can we construct a biosensor starting from a nanopore transducer element. What are the required steps.
   • By performing an antibody immobilization experiment on both, SPR or QCM, significant different values expressed in ng/cm2 were obtained. What can be a possible reason for this.
2. Lesson 3
   • Explain from an electron energy point of view the mechanism of current flow in a galvanic cell.
   • Discuss the pH dependence in water electrolysis and its relation to electrochemical processing.
3. Lesson 4
   • If given the choice between XPS and TOFSIMS for an analytical problem, when whould you certainly (not) choose XPS (or TOFSIMS)? Justify your answer.
   • Why is the addition of an in-situ AFM inside a TOFSIMS instrument a very interesting add-on and what would be the limitations?
4. Lesson 5
   • Explain the dynamics of the oxidation process 'Deal Grove model). Why is there a dependency on the Si crystal orientation and the type of oxidizing species.
   • Explain why for a cleaning process there is a pH dependency for metal contamination cleaning and for particulate contamination cleaning.
5. Lesson 6
   • Can you explain how bottom up approaches can enable further scaling in nano-electronic devices and discuss one example in more detail.
   • Explain the kinetics of SAM formation and why can they follow or deviate from the Langmuir growth law.
6. Lesson 7
   • How does the process control of a CVD process change when the temperature increases?
   • Silicon oxide is used as dielectric to isolate Cu metal lines. How can the dielectric constant of the insulator be reduced?
7. Lesson 8
   • ALD gives conformal films and growth control at the atomic level. Explain how this results from the ALD growth principle.
   • How has ALD contributed to innovations in CMOS technology.
   • Explain why surface preparation is needed for ALD of high-k-dielectric layers.