THERMAL PROFILE EVALUATION OF A SILICON WAFER IN THE APPARATUS FOR RAPID THERMAL CHEMICAL VAPOUR DEPOSITION

• Published in: Journal of Optoelectronics and Advanced Materials Vol. 7; no. 2; pp. 665 - 670
• Main Authors: Girtan, M, Logerais, P O, Avril, L, Gonzzatti, F, Bouteville, A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01.04.2005
• ISSN: 1454-4164

Rapid Thermal Processing (RTP) is currently a very popular technology. It is widely used for many applications in semiconductor manufacturing processes including annealing (Rapid Thermal Annealing, RTA), oxidation (Rapid Thermal Oxidation, RTO) and chemical vapour deposition (Rapid Thermal Chemical vapour Deposition, RTCVD). RTP systems are single-wafer, cold wall chambers that utilize radiant heat sources to rapidly heat up the semiconductor substrate at high temperature and maintain it for a short length of time. One of the main technological hurdles that RTP must overcome is that of heating the wafer uniformly. The aim of this contribution is to evaluate the different ways used for the simulation of the heating of a silicon wafer by infrared lamps in a RTCVD system. The simulation results obtained, especially the temperature profiles of the wafer, are compared with experimental data. The reactor of the RTCVD system used is cylindrical. The heating is performed with two banks of twelve tungsten-halogen lamps located above a quartz window on top of the reactor. Numerical calculations are carried out through a computational fluid dynamics code CFD'ACE+ by using both discrete ordinate method (DOM) or Monte-Carlo method (MCM) of the radiation module. Experimental results are obtained by heating a silicon wafer having thermocouples embedded along a wafer diameter. Finally, we conclude by a comparison between both the approaches.