RIE - Reactive Ion Etching

Fraunhofer ENAS offers a wide range of processes for structuring various surfaces. Our fleet of etching systems allows us to flexibly respond to substrate and technology requirements and enables process development for a variety of applications, materials, and material systems. With our reactive ion etching processes, we serve conventional MEMS/NEMS technology and integration technology, as well as quantum sensing, neuromorphic systems, or fundamental investigations of quantum technology. By using research reactors while simultaneously operating high-throughput production tools, we are able to offer both studies with a fundamental character and pure process performance for technology development and testing. Additionally, we can perform structuring of 100 mm, 150 mm, and 200 mm wafers in our cleanrooms, which is particularly advantageous for heterogeneous integration, such as hybrid bonding. Regarding materials, there are virtually no limitations in our cleanrooms. We are capable of conducting both fluorine-based and chlorine-based structuring plasmas and draw on many years of experience in plasma etching of various materials. Our expertise includes the structuring of common dielectrics such as silicon dioxide (SiO₂), silicon nitride (Si₃N₄), porous dielectrics, aluminum oxide, or hafnium oxide. Naturally, the metal structuring of typical barrier materials like tantalum nitride (TaN) or titanium nitride (TiN), as well as etching aluminum, tungsten, or molybdenum, is also part of our process portfolio. Particularly for LED manufacturing, etching processes of GaAs, GaN, or indium tin oxide are of enormous importance, so these materials can also be structured on our equipment.