Program Description:
The wide energy band gap, high thermal conductivity, large break down field, and high saturation velocity of silicon carbide makes this material an ideal choice for high temperature, high power, and high voltage electronic devices. In addition, its chemical inertness, high melting point, extreme hardness, and high wear resistance make it possible to fabricate sensors and actuators capable of performing in harsh environments, and hence the increasing interest in SiC for the microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) technology. Furthermore, SiC is an attractive material for micro and nanomechanical resonators due to the large ratio of it's Young's modulus to density, as compared to silicon. SiC technology remains technically demanding and non-standard in Si-based integrated circuit fabrication laboratories. Breakthroughs in SiC fabrication have recently been achieved at UC Berkeley, with the development of a single precursor CVD process for growing high quality, n-doped 3C-SiC films and of a high selectivity RIE process to etch the SiC films. In particular, the Berkeley group has demonstrated:
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