Institute of Microelectronics

The facilities and equipment of IMEL include a full silicon processing laboratory in a clean room, equipped with lithography (optical, e- beam) and etching tools, thermal and chemical processing facilities, ion implantation, deposition of metals, dielectrics and poly- nanocrystalline silicon by physical and chemical processes (LPCVD, sputtering, e-gun and thermal evaporation), and process inspection equipment. Satellite laboratories include electrical and optical characterization, micromachining and packaging laboratory, resist development laboratory, electron microscopy (SEM, STM/AFM), sensor characterization and testing equipment.
The clean room area for thermal, chemical and reactive ion etching processes of the Institute has been fully upgraded to class 1000, while lithography area to class 100, in the year 2002.
A new building of the Institute has been constructed in 2006 to host the electrical, optical and structural characterization laboratories. A photograph of the building in the final stage of construction is shown in the figure below.

The laboratory is certified under ISO 9001:2000 (Si processing and electrical characterizartion) and under ISO 17025:2005 (electrical measurements).
The equipment available and the expertise and competences include the following:

Equipment

Techniques/competences

Silicon processing laboratory in a clean room area of 500 m2, equipped with the following:

4 laminar flow chemical benches
7 horizontal hot-wall furnace tubes
2 horizontal LPCVD tubes for
nitride, oxide (TEOS), polysilicon
1 horizontal LPCVD tube for LTO
Ion Implanter (EATON medium
current, 200 KeV)
Optical lithography systems (resolution down to 0,6 μm)
reactive ion Etcher
Metallization equipment (thermal, e-gun evaporation, sputtering)

Process inspection equipment

Processing equipment not in clean room:

High Density Plasma Etcher
Different thin film deposition systems (Sputtering, MOCVD)

Nanopatterning technologies
Plasma etching
Growth of metals and dielectrics
Growth of polycrystalline and nanocrystalline Si
Growth of Si nanostructures embedded in a dielectric matrix, ordering of nanostructures
Fabrication of MOS capacitors and MOSFETs
Nanocrystal non-volatile memories
Micromachining, sensor fabrication, microfluidics
Molecular materials and devices
Thin film devices