A second look at reactive ion-beam etching and chemically-assisted ion-beam etching

The excellent anisotropy of the Reactive Ion Beam Etching (RIBE) process, its fairly high etch rate and the perfectly smooth etched surface have made it a desirable tool for III-V electronic and optoelectronic device fabrication. The properties of a microwave excited ion source have been examined, the influence of the various parameters and the etch effect of various gases in Chemical Assisted Ion Beam Etching (CAIBE) have been studied. Application to the fabrication of lasers have demonstrated that the initial reluctance to accept such a process for semiconductor device etching was not justified