Transfer of patterned ion-cut silicon layers

The technique of transferring patterned ion-cut layers from one Si wafer to another was demonstrated. The starting silicon wafer was masked with checkerboard and line patterns with a 3 mm thick polymethylmethacrylate/photoresist and was implanted with 5 x 10(16) H+ ions/cm(2) at 150 keV. After stripping off the mask, the wafer was bonded to an oxide-coated receptor wafer through low-temperature direct wafer bonding. Heat treatment of this bonded pair showed that the hydrogen- induced silicon surface layer cleavage (ion cut) could propagate throughout about 16 mu m x 16 mu m of nonimplanted material with implanted regions only 4 mu m wide. Mask width, mm spacing, and implantation profiles through the mask shape were shown to have effects on the internal microfracturing mechanisms. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics. [S0003-6951(98)00645-7].