Optical Characterization Of Soi Materials And Rf Performance Of Soi Devices

Silicon-on-insulator (SOI) is expected to become mainstream substrate for microelectronics in near future. For many applications, such as high-speed low-power ICs, high temperature and radiation electronics, SOI substrates offer numerous advantages as compared to bulk silicon. The performance of thin film microelectronic devices on SIMOX SOI substrates is highly dependent on the nature and perfection of the top-Si/BOX interfaces. In this research we demonstrate a non-destructive and in-situ characterization method of spectroscopic ellisometry that is sensitive to these interfacial regions. The dielectric functions of the composite materials in the transition regions were calculated using the Effective Medium Approximation (EMA). In addition, the interfacial roughness was also studied by TEM and AFM.The application of a silicon-on-insulator in a high-power integrated circuit is limited by the self-heating effect, caused by the poor thermal conductivity of the buried SiO2. We introduce tetrahedral amorphous-carbon thin films, formed by reactive filtered arc deposition method, as an alteration. The sp3/sp2 components in the thin films and the surface roughness were measured by spectroscopic ellipsometry (SE), which is well known for non-destructive and in-situ characterization application. The dielectric functions of the composite materials were calculated using the Bruggeman Effective Approximation (BEMA).The new communication markets are very demanding: high frequency, high degree of integration, low power consumption. SOI offers many advantages and this paper illustrates the potentialties of this technology for RF and microwave applications. The properties of the SOI MOSFET's are analyzed and compared to bulk Si MOSFET's. The models of transmission lines and inductors on SOI are compared from DC to the microwave region.