Reactive Ion Etcher (RIE)

• Subject Area: Electrical Engineering and Information Technology
• Term: Funded in 2026
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 568740253

The reactive ion etching (RIE) system is used for the dry chemical etching of components. The inductively coupled plasma technology (ICP, inductive-coupled plasma) allows the controlled adjustment of etching profiles and enables both anisotropic, i.e., vertical, and isotropic etching. The combination of fluorine and chlorine chemistry allows almost all common materials in the field of micro- and nanoelectronics to be etched. These include, for example, all silicon-based semiconductor materials (Si, SiC) and silicon dioxide, all III-V semiconductors, and many metals and superconductors. A load lock is essential to ensure clean chamber chemistry and increase the throughput of the system. Endpoint detection using a laser interferometer is essential for process monitoring. Pure argon ion sputtering processes for surface cleaning or oxygen plasma exposure to remove resist residues, and Faraday cage-assisted angular etching and basic atomic-layer-etching processes are also possible. The system is embedded in the Central Electronics and Information Technology Laboratory (ZEITlab) at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). The ZEITlab is an organizational unit of the School of Computation, Information and Technology (SoCIT). Since 2022, it has been housed in the new TUM Electrical Engineering and Information Technology building on the Garching campus. The center consists of a clean room with an area of 950 m² and associated characterization laboratories. Its vision is to establish a "makerspace for microelectronics prototypes" that supports a wide range of research areas as a broad-based technology center of SoCIT. In the ZEITlab, proof-of-concept demonstrators in the field of electronics and sensor technology are realized on the basis of modern materials and components and made available for various fields of application. This type of "rapid prototyping" uses innovative processing and characterization technologies and is systematically supplemented by circuit design and modelling. ZEITlab provides a central and shared access to micro- and nanofabrication for a large number of research groups working on topics such as quantum and sensor technologies, micro-, opto-, and neuroelectronics, as well as hybrid nanosystems. The bundled infrastructure, therefore, enables an efficient transfer of technologies from basic research to engineering issues and applications.

• DFG Programme: Major Research Instrumentation
• Major Instrumentation: Reactive Ion Etcher
• Applicant Institution: Technische Universität München (TUM)
• Leader: Professor Dr.-Ing. Markus Becherer