Silicon Wafer Glossary
Technical terms, which we use on the website:
A
Alloy : Alloys are created by mixing metals or metals with other chemical elements, resulting in specific material properties, such as corrosion resistance or mechanical properties.
Angstrom (Å): A unit of length equal to 10^(-10) meters, used to express very small lengths comparable to the size of atoms.
Annealing (Glass): A process that removes internal stress within glass structures by slowly cooling hot-formed glass, preventing spontaneous cracking. Annealing temperature typically ranges from 454°C to 482°C.
B
Bow: Concavity or deformation of the wafer measured from the center, independent of any thickness variation.
C
Chemical Resistance: The ability of a material’s surface to resist reactions with other chemical agents that could degrade its chemical structure.
Cleanliness: Measure of contaminants and particles deposited on a substrate surface, which can lead to defects in final products.
Conductivity: Measure of a material’s ability to conduct electricity. The inverse of conductivity is resistivity.
Crystal : A solid in which molecules, atoms, or ions are arranged in an orderly pattern that repeats in all three spatial dimensions.
Crystal Orientation:Determined by Miller indices (hkl), describing how crystal planes intersect the main crystallographic axes.
Czochralski Method: Technique for obtaining monocrystals developed by Polish chemist Jan Czochralski, involving controlled crystallization of molten material.
D
Defect Concentration: Concentration of imperfections in crystals, such as point or layer breaks in their lattice system regularity.
Density: Ratio of a substance’s weight to the volume it occupies.
Dopant: Chemical element added to a semiconductor to alter its conductivity.
Doping: Process of adding dopants to a semiconductor to modify its conductivity and resistivity.
E
Epitaxy: Semiconductor technology for growing new monocrystalline layers on an existing crystalline substrate.
F
Face-Centered Cubic Structure: Crystallographic system in which all three axes are of equal length and perpendicular to each other.
Float Glass: Glass production method producing almost perfectly flat, distortion-free glass.
I
Ingot: Pure crystal formed by methods such as the Czochralski method, used for further processing.
Insulator: Material with very low electrical conductivity.
N
N-Type: Doped semiconductor with an excess of electrons, resulting in negative conductivity.
P
Phonon: Quasiparticle representing quantum energy of vibration of a crystal lattice.
P-Type: Doped semiconductor with electron deficiency, resulting in positive conductivity.
Prime Grade: Highest quality wafers used for device production.
R
Refractive Index: Magnitude of light refraction from one medium to another.
Resistivity: Measure of a material’s resistance to electric current.
Roughness:Surface irregularities finer than its shape, dependent on material and treatment.
S
Sapphire: Mineral characterized by high hardness, often used in semiconductor applications.
Semiconductor: Substance with conductivity between metals and dielectrics, whose conductivity can be varied.
SIMOX: Separation by Implantation of Oxygen, a process for forming silicon layers by oxygen ion implantation.
T
Test Grade: Lower-quality wafers used for research and testing.
Thermal Oxidation: Process for producing thin oxide layers on wafers, typically silicon dioxide.
Thermal Resistance: Measure of a material’s resistance to heat transfer.
Thickness: Distance between the front and back surfaces of a wafer.
Total Thickness Variation (TTV): Difference in thickness between the thickest and thinnest parts of a wafer.
W
Wafer: Thin plate of semiconductor material used in electronic integrated circuits and solar cells.
Warp: Difference between the minimum and maximum values of a wafer surface.
Z
Zincblende Structure: Cubic crystal structure characterized by tetrahedral coordination of atoms.
Explore Essential Silicon Wafer Glossary Terminology