Title: Elimination of boundary effect in silicon electrochemical etching via mechanical stress

Authors: Daohan Ge; Le Lu; Xiukang Huang; Jinhua Zhang; Dongliang Qian; Liqiang Zhang; Zhibao Li

Addresses: Micro/Nano Science and Technology Center, School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China ' Micro/Nano Science and Technology Center, School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China ' Micro/Nano Science and Technology Center, School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China ' Micro/Nano Science and Technology Center, School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China ' Micro/Nano Science and Technology Center, School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China ' Laboratory of Span-Scale Design and Manufacturing for MEMS/NEMS/OEDS, School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China ' Institute for Advanced Materials, School of Material Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212013, China

Abstract: Application of thick macroporous silicon is always one of the hotspots in electrochemistry including micromachining and chemical sensing. One serious problem in macropore formation with high depth-width ratio is the boundary effect. In this work, we applied mechanical stress onto the boundary region of electrochemical etching, which helps to passivate the sidewall of macropore in boundary area, and therefore eliminate the boundary effect effectively. The CBM model was employed to explain the mechanism. Thick macroporous layers without boundary effect were successfully produced in both n-type and p-type silicon.

Keywords: electrochemical etching; macroporous silicon; boundary effect elimination; mechanical stress; current burst model; electrochemistry; macropore formation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMSI.2016.082123

International Journal of Materials and Structural Integrity, 2016 Vol.10 No.4, pp.170 - 180

Received: 22 Oct 2016
Accepted: 22 Oct 2016
Published online: 07 Feb 2017 *

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