Patents by Inventor Michael Thomas Tucker

Michael Thomas Tucker has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Method of handling a silicon wafer
    Patent number: 6663674
    Abstract: A recycling procedure for 300 mm nitride dummy wafers which have a stabilization layer of silicon dioxide is provided. The recycling procedure is essentially based on selectively wet etching the deposited silicon nitride with respect to the silicon dioxide stabilization layer, preferably with hot phosphoric acid at 160° C. In particular, a method of handling a silicon wafer which is employed as a dummy wafer during a nitride deposition process includes the steps of depositing a silicon dioxide layer on the wafer surface, performing the nitride deposition process on the wafer to deposit silicon nitride or silicon oxinitride on the wafer surface until a predetermined layer thickness is reached, and etching the silicon nitride or silicon oxinitride layer selectively with respect to the silicon dioxide layer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 19, 2002
    Date of Patent: December 16, 2003
    Assignees: Infineon Technologies SC300 GmbH & Co. KG, Infineon Technologies AG, Motorola Inc.
    Inventors: Michael Thomas Tucker, Terry Breeden, Stefan Ottow, Wolfram Köstler, Dan Wissel
  • Method of handling a silicon wafer
    Publication number: 20020173154
    Abstract: A recycling procedure for 300 mm nitride dummy wafers which have a stabilization layer of silicon dioxide is provided. The recycling procedure is essentially based on selectively wet etching the deposited silicon nitride with respect to the silicon dioxide stabilization layer, preferably with hot phosphoric acid at 160° C. In particular, a method of handling a silicon wafer which is employed as a dummy wafer during a nitride deposition process includes the steps of depositing a silicon dioxide layer on the wafer surface, performing the nitride deposition process on the wafer to deposit silicon nitride or silicon oxinitride on the wafer surface until a predetermined layer thickness is reached, and etching the silicon nitride or silicon oxinitride layer selectively with respect to the silicon dioxide layer.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 19, 2002
    Publication date: November 21, 2002
    Inventors: Michael Thomas Tucker, Terry Breeden, Stefan Ottow, Wolfram Kostler, Dan Wissel
  • Plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method to fill a trench in a semiconductor substrate
    Patent number: 6362098
    Abstract: In a CVD chamber (120) having a chuck (122) to hold a semiconductor substrate (100) and having a plasma generator (121) to generate a plasma (125), a trench in the substrate is filled with dielectric material from ions (126) of the plasma. The ions are forced to move in a direction (127) that is substantially perpendicular to the surface of the substrate by a pulsed unidirectional voltage between the plasma generator and the substrate, by a circular magnetic field, or by a combination of both fields.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 28, 2001
    Date of Patent: March 26, 2002
    Assignees: Motorola, Inc., Semiconductor 300 GmbH & Co. KG, Infineon Technologies AG
    Inventors: Terry Alan Breeden, Iraj Eric Shahvandi, Michael Thomas Tucker, Olivier Gerard Marc Vatel, Karl Emerson Mautz, Ralf Zedlitz