Silicon etch process options for micro- and nanotechnology using inductively coupled plasmas

Silicon is an essential material in the fabrication of a continually expanding range of micro- and nano-scale opto-and microelectronic devices. The fabrication of many such devices requires patterning of the silicon but until recently exploitation of the technology has been restricted by the difficulty of forming the ever-smaller features and higher aspect ratios demanded. Plasma etching through a mask layer is a very useful means for fine-dimension patterning of silicon. In this work, several solutions are presented for the micro- and nano-scale etching of silicon using inductively coupled plasmas ICP.