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Hardware interview practice

Compare Conventional RIE with ICP Etching

EasyPhysical DesignSystemVerilog

A process engineer needs an anisotropic plasma etch with high ion flux but would like to tune ion energy independently to protect the wafer surface. Which comparison supports the process choice?

Choose one

Answer choices

  1. A. ICP is a purely wet chemical etch with no ions, while RIE is a purely physical sputter with no reactive radicals.
  2. B. RIE and ICP differ only in chamber name; pressure, density, bias, anisotropy, damage, and selectivity cannot change between them.
  3. C. Both methods combine reactive chemistry and directed ion bombardment, but an ICP source can create a high-density plasma separately from the wafer-bias power, allowing ion flux and ion energy to be tuned more independently than in a conventional capacitively coupled RIE.
  4. D. Higher ion energy always improves selectivity and eliminates substrate damage, so source density and chemistry do not need control.
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