Bubble-Free Silicon Wafer Bonding in a Non-Cleanroom Environment

Abstract

Bubble-free bonding of 4-inch silicon wafers on either silicon or quartz wafers is achieved outside a cleanroom. Two wafers are stacked horizontally in a rack with the two mirror-polished surfaces facing each other. In order to avoid wafer contact during hydrophilization, cleaning, and drying, the wafers are separated in the rack by teflon spacers introduced at the wafer edges. After drying the wafers by a spin dryer, the spacers are removed and bonding occurs. Using this procedure we are also able to monitor the bonding process between quartz and silicon wafers at different temperatures. We find that the initial wafer bonding process at room temperature stops operating at temperatures above 200°C.