Abstract: In an electronic system such as an integrated circuit having a number of destination loads such as logic gates, signal is distributed along typically a zero'th level (e.g., polysilicon) electrical transmission line from an input terminal to the destination loads. The characteristics of the signal arriving at the destination loads are improved by (1) inserting an added electrical transmission line, and (2) connecting various nodes of the added electrical transmission line through auxiliary active devices, such as inverters, to various nodes on the zero'th level electrical transmission line. In one attractive arrangement, each of the auxiliary active devices has an electrical-current-drive capability that increases monotonically with the number of nodes intervening between it and the input terminal of the added electrical transmission line.

Abstract: A diamond body, such as a CVD diamond film, is etched by immersion of the body in a molten or partially molten metal, such as the rare earth metal La or Ce. While the body is being etched, various portions of a major surface of the body can be protected for various time durations by masks against the etching--whereby, after dicing the body, the resulting dies can be used as submounts for lasers with feedback.

Abstract: A fiber probe device includes a fiber segment that has at least three sections. An uppermost section has the largest diameter; an intermediate section has an intermediate diameter, and a lowest section (tip) has the smallest diameter. The presence of the intermediate section enables control over the stiffness of the section located immediately above the tip as well as control over the mechanical resonance characteristic of the probe device when it scans a sample surface to be measured.

Abstract: A probe device is fabricated from a glass fiber segment by first isotropically etching only a portion of the diameter of only a bottom region thereof. Next, the bottom region is cleaved, to produce a cleaved bottom endface. Then the cleaved endface and a height of the sidewalls of the bottom region that is less than its total height are coated with a protective masking layer. The fiber segment is immersed in an isotropic etching solution, whereby its diameter is reduced. Finally, the masking layer is stripped off, and the bottom region is etched again until the (maximum) diameter of the cleaved endface is reduced to a desired value.

Abstract: A given testing substrate for fast-testing many integrated-circuit electronic devices, one after the other, has a set of mutually insulated collated wiring areas that can be aligned with solder-bump I/O pads of the electronic devices. At the surface of each of the corrugated areas is located a layer that is an electrically conductive durable oxide, or that is itself durable, electrically conductive, and non-oxidizable. During testing, the solder-bump I/O pads of the electronic device being tested are aligned with and pressed against the corrugated wiring areas of the given substrate. Alternatively, the electronic devices being of the electrically programmable variety, such as EPROMs, programming voltages can be delivered to each of the devices, one after the other, through the corrugated wiring areas of a single substrate.

Abstract: An electronic device, such as an integrated circuit chip or a multichip module, is held in place overlying a circuit board, with which it is thermal expansion mismatched, by three or more localized rigid support elements. The bottom surface of the chip is bonded to the top surface of preferably only one of these support elements and can laterally slide along the top surfaces of the others in response to heating and cooling during electrical operations of the electronic device. In addition, the electronic device is encapsulated in a soft gel that is held in place by a rigid plastic half-shell cover that is epoxy-bonded in place along its perimeter (edge).

Abstract: A multi-chip module is composed of two or more integrated-circuit chips located on a substrate such as a dielectrically coated silicon substrate. The chips are interconnected by means of transmission wiring lines. At least some of the chips contain one or more input buffer circuits, each composed of two branches ("legs"). Each such branch contains, in one embodiment, an n-channel MOS transistor connected in series with a pair of series-connected p-channel MOS transistors--whereby, in each such branch, one of the p-channel MOS transistors is located between (intermediate) the other of the p-channel MOS transistors and the n-channel MOS transistor of that same branch. On the other hand, in each buffer circuit, the intermediate p-channel MOS transistors of both branches are cross-coupled.

Abstract: A heterostructure includes a stained epitaxial layer of either silicon or germanium that is located overlying a silicon substrate, with a spatially graded Ge.sub.x Si.sub.1-x epitaxial layer overlain by a ungraded Ge.sub.x.sbsb.0 Si.sub.1-x.sbsb.0 intervening between the silicon substrate and the strained layer. Such a heterostructure can serve as a foundation for such devices as surface emitting LEDs, either n-channel or p-channel silicon-based MODFETs, and either n-channel or p-channel silicon-based MOSFETs.

Abstract: Parallel metallization lines for a substrate of an electronic device, such as complementary bit (B and B) lines for an SRAM cell array, are formed by:forming a uniformly thick aluminum layer with an underlying and overlying dielectric oxide layer, the underlying oxide layer being located overlying the substrate,patterning the overlying oxide and the aluminum layers to form the aluminum bit line (B) with an overlying dielectric oxide layer on its top surface, typically by means of reactive ion etching,depositing a further dielectric oxide layer on the entire surface of the structure including the sidewalls of the aluminum bit line (B), andreactive ion etching the top surface of the oxide layer, whereby an oxide layer remains on the top and sidewall surfaces of the aluminum bit line (B) but not elsewhere.

Abstract: A phase-shifting lithographic mask, for use in conjunction with optical radiation of wavelength .lambda., has a transparent substrate upon which are successively located a bottom (2m+1).pi. radian phase-shifting layer and a patterned top (2n+1).pi. radian phase-shifting layer each having at least approximately the same refractive index at the wavelength .lambda. as that of the substrate. A more finely patterned, opaque chromium layer is located on the patterned top phase-shifting layer. The bottom phase-shifting layer is chemically different from both the substrate and the top layer, in order to provide either etch-stopping or end-point etch detection during subsequent dry ion beam millings--as with gallium ions--of either or both of the layers, for the purpose of mask repair. For example, the substrate is quartz (silicon dioxide), the bottom phase-shifting layer is calcium fluoride, and the top phase-shifting layer is silicon dioxide.

Abstract: A fiber probe is formed from a cladded optical fiber segment by isotropically etching a lower portion of the fiber segment, followed by cleaving the resulting etched lower portion. The resulting cleaved endface of the fiber segment is then coated with a protective layer which is then patterned by exposure to optical radiation propagating down the core of the fiber segment followed by development. A plasma etching, masked by the thus patterned protective layer, removes a desired height of cladding in the neighborhood of the cleaved endface. Finally, the lower regions of the fiber segment are subjected to a further etching to reduce the width of the tip to a desired value.

Abstract: A fiber probe device includes a fiber segment that has at least three sections. An uppermost section has the largest diameter; an intermediate section has an intermediate diameter, and a lowest section (tip) has the smallest diameter. The presence of the intermediate section enables control over the stiffness of the section located immediately above the tip as well as control over the mechanical resonance characteristic of the probe device when it scans a sample surface to be measured.

Abstract: A magnetoresistive medium for sensing magnetic fields is formed by a metallic alloy that contains spinodally decomposed ferromagnetic particles having at least one thickness dimension equal to or less than approximately 0.01 .mu.m.

Abstract: In order to print an isolated feature having a width W in a photoresist layer using an optical radiation imaging system whose lateral magnification is equal to m, a phase-shifting mask is used having a corresponding isolated feature. In one embodiment this corresponding isolated feature has a central square portion having a refractive index n.sub.1 and a thickness t.sub.1, and a peripheral (rim) square-ring phase-shifting portion having a width B, as well as a refractive index n.sub.2 and a thickness t.sub.2, such that the phase-shift .phi.=2.pi.(n.sub.2 t.sub.2 -n.sub.1 t.sub.1)/.lambda. of the central portion relative to the peripheral portion is equal to .pi. radian or odd multiple integral thereof. The width C of the central portion advantageously is selected such that mC/W is equal to at least 1.2, and preferably greater than 1.5, rather than unity.

Abstract: A phase-shifting lithographic mask is fabricated, in one embodiment, by using a resist layer that is negative tone with respect to a (patterned) electron beam and is positive tone with respect to a (flood) mid-ultraviolet beam, with the tone of the electron beam predominating over that of the mid-ultraviolet beam. The resist layer is spun on a body comprising a patterned metallic layer located on a (transparent) quartz slab. The body is subjected from below to a flood mid-ultraviolet beam and from above to a patterned electron beam whose edges are located somewhere in the midst of the patterned opaque layer but are not coincident with any edges of the patterned opaque layer. Thus, a subsequent development of the resist layer removes those regions and only those regions of the resist layer upon which the ultraviolet beam was incident--i.e., not in the shadows cast by the patterned opaque layer--in the absence of incidence of the patterned electron beam.

Abstract: A diamond body, such as a CVD diamond film, is thinned by placing the body--at an elevated temperature and under pressure--in contact with a molten or partially molten alloy of a rare earth metal and a metallic impurity that lowers the melting point of the rare earth metal. Typically, the rare earth metal is cerium and the impurity is nickel.The pressure is typically less than approximately 0.2 MPa (Mega Pascal), preferably less than approximately 0.02 MPa, and the temperature is within a range whose lower limit is approximately 100 C. degrees below the melting point of the alloy of the rare earth plus impurity metal.

Abstract: In an optical lithographical system (e.g., 100) for printing features of a patterned mask (e.g., 103) into a workpiece (e.g., 120), such as in a semiconductor device, a one- or two-dimensional (depending on the features of the mask) optical transmission phase-shift diffracting device (e.g., 107) is inserted between an optical condensor (e.g., 105) and the patterned mask whose features are to be printed into the workpiece. The diffracting device is designed so as to enable an imaging lens system (e.g., 102) to collect more than merely a single order of the resulting diffraction patterns of the features of the mask and, by varying the spatial periodicity of the diffracting device, to tailor the illumination incident on the mask in accordance with the features (e.g., 114, 115) of the mask.

Abstract: A phase-shifting lithographic mask having two or more self-aligned phase-shifting regions is fabricated by a sequence of etchings of the phase-shifting mask using a protective resist layer having three or more regions that have been subjected to mutually different doses (including possibly zero) of actinic radiation-such as electron beam, ion beam, or photon beam radiation. A self-aligned opaque region can be supplied by carbonization of remaining resist material.

Abstract: In the prior art, selective epitaxial growth (SEG) of semiconductors, performed typically in rectangular windows penetrating through a masking layer located on a major surface of semiconductor substrate, suffers from unwanted facet formation at the corners of the windows--whereby the desirable planar area available for transistor fabrication is reduced. Such facet formation is suppressed--i.e., the area occupied by unwanted facets is reduced--by adding a relatively small lobe penetrating through the masking layer at each corner of each window prior to performing the SEG, whereby transistor packing density can be increased.

Abstract: Integrated circuit chip-to-chip interconnections are made via gold pads on each chip that are bonded to corresponding gold pads on a silicon wafer chip carrier. The pads on the chips and/or the pads on the carrier are characterized by texturing (roughening) with a feature size of the order of a micrometer or less, so that each of the pads on the chip can be attached to each of the pads on the carrier by compression bonding at room temperature--i.e., cold-well bonding. In particular, the texturing of the gold pads on the silicon carrier is obtained by etching V-grooves locally on the surface of the underlying silicon carrier in the regions of the pads, thermally growing a silicon dioxide layer on the silicon career, and depositing the gold on the silicon dioxide layer.