Silicon dioxide, chip protection

The chip laboratories also present some difficulties not found in macroscopic laboratories. The main problem concerns the large surface area of the capillaries and reaction chambers relative to the sample volume. Molecules or biological cells in the sample solution encounter so much wall that they may undergo unwanted reactions with the wall materials. Glass seems to present the least of these problems, and the walls of silicon chip laboratories can be protected by formation of relatively inert silicon dioxide. Because plastic is inexpensive, it seems a good choice for disposable chips, but plastic also is the most reactive with the samples and the least durable of the available materials. 

Although the surface of most IC chips has been passivated with a layer of inorganic dielectric material such as silicon dioxide or silicon nitride (polyimides have also been used as final passivating layers), the protection provided by such layers is not sufficient to ensure reliable operation throughout the lifetime of the device. The three basic methods of protection are... 

A printed circuit has many n-p-n junction transistors. Fig. 10.33 illustrates the formation of one transistor area. The chip begins as a thin wafer of silicon that has been doped with an n-type impurity. A protective layer of silicon dioxide is then produced on the wafer by exposing it in a furnace to an oxidizing atmosphere. The next step is to produce a p-type semiconductor. To do this, the surface of the oxide is covered by a polymeric photoresist, as shown in Fig. 10.33(a). A template that only allows light to shine... 

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