Growing Colorful Oxide Layers on Silicon
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 21 ส.ค. 2024
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In this video I'm growing nanometer layers of Silicon Dioxide (glass) on the surface of a silicon wafer, and using optical interference to infer the thickness of these layers. I'm also showing how to troubleshoot errors in order to make a more consistent end result.
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In industrial tube furnaces, they have multiple heating zones to deal with the spatial temperature gradient issue. Each zone has its own heating coils and thermocouple, so heating power can be distributed to where it's needed to keep the temperature even throughout the whole length of the furnace. If you ever build an upgraded furnace, it would probably be worth giving the ends of the tube their own heating zones. For the steam consistency problem, maybe a mass flow sensor controlling the boiler heat to keep consistent steam flow into the furnace would help.
The independent zones would be a godsend. I may implement that when I rebuild the furnace!
Given the size and quality of your channel, I expected to have to wait much longer for your next upload. I understand if you will have to take longer for some future videos, but let's just say I would be happy if you could keep this up :). At this pace, you will have your own transistors in no time!
Thanks! I'm hoping for transistors in a month or two!
I'm doing my PhD in material science and Mems fabrication and have to say I'm really impressed. Not only by your results but also the quality of the video and the depth of knowledge you seem to have to be able to explain everything in a simple manner without errors!
Thank you :) I strive for a clear, concise explanation
Hell yeah man so glad to see you upload again. Hope you keep it up!
Thanks! I've got at least three or four more videos in the works currently. I'll try to get one out every couple weeks
Glad TH-cam recommended this, hope to see your channel grow a lot further
Thanks I hope so too :)
Sam Zeloof has entered the chat.
Oh man I would love to pick his brain someday. His wire bonder and lithography setup in particular!
In the 1980's I worked in wafer fabrication. Back then, we used to measure SiO₂ layer thicknesses by their colours. Whilst there, I was working on Silicon Nitride coatings for specialist devices. The Nitride layer thicknesses could also be gauged by their colours. Nitride colours on Silicon are even more striking than Oxide colours.
Great video man. Eagerly awaiting the next in the series
I've got three more on the way already :)
@@projectsinflight that's great to hear, good luck
Just as good, if not even better then your previous video!
This is already my favourite series on yt at the moment, and i am so excited you are taking us along your journey!
You seem surprised, at how well your content is recieved, but what's not to like about it?
It is a very interesting topic. You are demystifying something all of us use on a daily basis. Something that seems like magic to so many, and yet you diy it.
On top of that your explanations are concise and easy to follow. You get to the point and down to the wire with no distractions.
Keep doing what your doing, and i am sure, you'll gain even more traction very quickly!
Thank you! I'm really excited to do my video on diffusion, though I have no idea how I'm going to explain it in less than 20m lol.
@@projectsinflight I, at least, wouldn't have an issue if it was an hour instead :).
@@projectsinflight Why not stretch it to 30-40 min if needed?, i watch with 2x anyways
@@projectsinflightI'd encourage you to take all the time you need in both upload schedule and video duration. Being concise is not about explaining something in less than twenty minutes but about explaining everything that's necessary and nothing that isn't and you are very good at that! Also NileRed has shown that 30 to 60 Minute scientific content can work extremely well on TH-cam. I really like your content and honestly expected at least three years of back catalogue (of learning and figuring stuff out) just based on the quality of the first video I watched.
I wish you the best of luck and skill for the project moving forward. Having people like asianometry talk about industrial (and comparatively high-tech) processes is one thing, but following the basics "in the lab" will be exciting to watch. Makes the topic way more graspable.
My goal is to make this approachable, and I hope i can keep it up!
Woah this rocks. Love seeing people do things in their garage that were previously restricted to university labs and billion-dollar companies.
Just as long as you don't expect 10nm processes any time soon :P
Damn dude, 3rd video and its all glittering gold. I cant wait to see more.
Thanks! I'm excited to show some of my upcoming work on diffusion
It's funny, I'm very interested in silicon chip manufacture being a programmer and electrical tinkerer, and I'm very interested in anodizing since I'm into custom knives as well as body jewelry which use anodizing (usually of titanium) for aesthetic purposes. This is a great fusion of those subjects
this is simply amazing, please keep uploading and showing your process, the way you explain everything is very clear and informative, i love it. thank you❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Thank you so much! I strive to improve my ability to condense dense topics :)
@@projectsinflight i plan on making semiconductors myself in my university, and i will probably use your videos as a guide in some steps. Do you know of any modern resources for what to read or see on the topic? I've seen some stuff but it's like 50 years old. Thank you for answering!!!
@@juanma4978 To be honest if you are at a university you will have access to far better equipment. My advice is to find the people responsible for maintaining that equipment and ask them exactly what you asked me.
@@projectsinflight yeah, the thing is, this is in argentina hahaha so not many resources in that way, and there is not much knowledge about circuit making, so if you know of any book you would recommend it would be hugely appreciated!! thanks for the kind responses
I am hoping to make my own chips eventually. If you want a tip, you should be able to apply a mask using a modern DLP chip used for 3d printing. TI has some chips that just came out that should have roughly 1um per pixel mirrors if you create a custom setup similar to Breaking Taps' UV laser optics. The chips are about 4k resolution and should cost between 1k and 2k to purchase. I don't have the room right now to set everything up, but maybe you can get it to work. The holy grail would be to be able to make chips at home for less than 10k, but it is difficult. Might be more feasible to use a very precise laser engraver with some fancy optics. I am very excited to see more!
Of course we're interested in this topic, it's super interesting, at least it is for me and apparently many others too. Before clicking on this video I had no clue about anything to do with making ICs. Going to be following this project closely.
Thanks! it means a lot
Nick, I am impressed by the science content in these videos of course, but also by how accessible and understandable your descriptions are. Good work!
Very cool - the lithography step should be pretty interesting and perhaps the step that will really define a lot of fabrication capability
Yep! lithography will be one of the next three videos I make for sure. Not sure the order yet.
This channel will grow fast
fingers crossed!
For steam generation you might look at the small steam cleaners that are sold for use in cleaning bathrooms. They have a pressurized tank and would allow the water in the tank to get above the boiling point of water at atmospheric pressure. It might allow the production of a more consistent steam.
Someone had an interesting idea to use an ultrasonic humidifier which I might try soon
I love the subtle throw away humor.
"The take away here is to better insulate your steam generator"
well yeah, I need to make note of that for my personal wafer production facility
:)
Wow I love your optimism. Some other channels have done home semiconductor fabrication but none of them have made it look easy.
My goal is to use materials and equipment that isn't out-of-reach of hobbyists. Wish me luck lol
Dope stuff; I love how in depth your explanations are :)
Thanks! I hope I am doing a good job condensing it :)
I don't know how this came onto my recommendations list, but here we are and I enjoyed the abstract side step from things I usually go into.
Glad you dropped by :)
Fantastic video as others have said, that was so enjoyable to watch! Thank you for taking us along with you on this journey, and good luck dialing in the next set of processes!
Thanks! I am certainly trying! Diffusion and lithography should be soon!
Fascinating, love the applied science / breaking taps style and focus on the super tech in the home lab. Excellent production and attention to detail. Subscribed.
This is super cool! Love the animations and well labeled examples of what's going on.
Thanks! I hope to improve on the animations going forward too
Instead of using boiling water to generate steam could you instead use a ultrasonic water vaporizer? For example a humidifier or diffuser? I imagine that would be much more consistent.
That actually sounds like a great idea. I may try that. I think in industry they might just drip water directly into the tube or something too
@@projectsinflight I don't know how one would go about it exactly, but a "superheater" of sorts where the steam is passed through something at the temperature you want may keep it at that 100c+ temp. Armchair thought but it might work?
@@ericlotze7724 Actually just sticking the tube in the furnace a little farther can serve the purpose. I noticed that would dramatically improve the steam output. It's possible just a better insulated glass tube would work as well!
"Wait, where are you going?? Come back!" Hahaha. I think it was the one part of the video I felt confident I could do.
Again, a very informative and to the point video ❤
Thanks! I appreciate the encouragement
I'm so excited for the rest of this series. Your videos are extremely interesting and well-made~
Thanks! I am eager to share more
I'm really anticipating seeing your first diode made in this process.
Should be relatively soon- within a month or two
God it must be annoying if you are trying to get a precise thickness of oxide with this many precise variables.great video.extremely under rated channel
It definitely took a while to lock it down but it's actually not too hard with better equipment
@@projectsinflight well respect for doing it with the equipment you have. I'd love to see more
I am very interested in your project, great job so far. I work at a large semiconductor fab so if you have any questions going forward i'd be willing to help. My specific area of expertise is with ion implantation equipment (the tools that doped your wafers with Boron) but I have friends in just about every functional group (dry/wet etch, photolitho, diffusion, CVD/PVD, CMP, Metrology, etc..) so I'm sure I could find the answers. I look forward to watching future videos.
If you get the chance, please email me (gmail of the same name) I'd love to talk! There is a surprising amount of information that is either locked behind paywalls or just not readily available and getting some pointers would help a LOT
Your quality to subscriber/watch ratio is all out of whack. Excellent content!
Getting there one day at a time lol :)
Fantastic videos. I appreciate you explaining problems and solutions/troubleshooting so clearly.
It's a skill I am perpetually honing! Thanks for the compliment!
Please keep your project moving. It is really interesting to learn the process in general and all that little details.
Working on it! I should have a video out in a week or so
Amazing work. Ben from Applied Science would be proud.
He actually commented on my first video and I was super thrilled!
this is really cool. i dont even think i would bother to do something like this, but it's cool to see what seems like industrial only processes being brought down to the common home setup. obviously not everything can have the same quality, but lots of things that seem relegated to precision machines can be done at home if you're patient and it's cool to see someone presenting this to everyday people.
Thanks :) I'm hoping that when I make some diodes in the near future I can compare them to lab-produced ones and show the tradeoffs
I did NOT expect the next video to come this early.
I am however VERY positively surprised!
Keep it up! I love it!
My goal is to release at least one or two videos per month- at least for the next few. Not sure how long it's gonna take once i've cleared out the easy ones lol
@@projectsinflight I'm so looking forward to it!
I've been interested in this stuff for a while, but never seen it like that!
Stumbled upon your channel this morning, loving your work!
New fav channel! Thanks for doing this and sharing!!
Thanks! It means a lot to me :)
Guy, this is probably the best project and channel on TH-cam!😊
Thanks man! It means a lot to me
holy crap dude, this is incredible stuff! utterly fascinating that you can get this to work on your lonesome!
Thanks! It's been a lot of work but it's very rewarding!
Damn, you're absolutely crushing it with these concise and informative videos, you're opening the gates for a lotta people to follow your work here.
As long as people are being safe with this stuff, I will be happy to support them :)
From the whitepapers I've seen, copper oxide is the way2go for homebrew semiconductor ICs. They had some struggles back in the day but it looks like it's possible to make functioning transistors with cuprous oxide, and their bandgap is much lower and the power requirement for switching them is thus lower. They can switch fast at low power! Having to use a silicon crystal wafer to make an IC is so far out of the reach of decentralizing semiconductor fabrication that it's a moot point. We need more people exploring and experimenting with alternatives to silicon, using materials that are commonly available to everyone. IC fabrication needs to be decentralized. It's the only real stranglehold that corporations still hold over the people (social media platforms are already about to be completely decentralized and become entirely p2p like a bitcoin/tor hybrid, so don't worry about that). We could also use some flying cars, so if you have spare time to look into antigravity, that'd be neato too :P
Silicon wafers are widely available these days and not really all that expensive.
PLEASE KEEP AT IT!!!!!
I've got several videos planned- hopefully one every two weeks or so!
This is incredible. Very excited to see what comes next.
New subscriber!👍
I am happy to have found your Channel, as it is fairly new.
Your channel has a professional & high quality presentation to it.
I love the content!
I believe your Channel ( if you stay with it & don't leave) will grow to have hundreds of thousands of subscribers, maybe more?
Can't wait for the next episode!
Great job! 👍
I am pausing watching Ahsoka to watch your video, that can tell you something. And i really like the Ahsoka...
I am proud to earn such respect :)
Can't wait to see the final chip working!
Me too lol
Fantastic video, can't wait to see where you take this! I'm almost inspired to try and build my own tube furnace, you make it look like a breeze!
Most of my time was spent writing code actually, and the second most time was spent overengineering my chassis lol. Feel free to use my code (link in the description) if you want
silicon wafers make me smile:)✨
Fascinating. I love it. Knowledge baby, knowledge.
Fascinating, and aesthetically pleasing. Look forward to future videos.
P.S. this was my first time ever hearing someone with US accent correctly pronounce the word "niche". It grates me when I hear "nitch" - I just can't help myself!
Haha! I do my best :)
Man im loving your content, even the learning opportunities (aka failures) included to then see how it is improved. Very cool stuff. Wonder what you'll end up baking
Fantastic because I'll have A LOT of failures in an upcoming diffusion video lol
Re: steam generation, maybe you can run the steam generator with a water intake and pre-heating instead of a reservior. That should give you pretty precise measurements of the amount of steam generated, the flow rate of the intake, and more accurate control of the power that the hotplate can transfer to the water as heat. If the plate's temperature controller is so sensitive to a body of high heat capacity on top, it would reduce that as well.
That's definitely a good idea that i'll explore when I rebuild the oven (which i'll do fairly soon)
Just a note about the thinfilm interference. I was also give that explanation in uni, however the mechanism isn't that they destructively cancel out, as that would result in energy disappearing which would break physics. What happens is that you force the light to be absorbed. It's a petty distinction, and your explanation is an easy explanation for begginers.
what absorbs that energy? atmo?
@@KarlF45 the material its hitting.
Oh interesting. I should look into that more- I always just kinda assumed that the interference was some kind of optical illusion. Didn't realize it was absorbtion.
@@projectsinflight applied science got me into it, its around the 9 minute mark. He's talking about transmission though th-cam.com/video/iwj78pR46zM/w-d-xo.htmlsi=mdBdrVqtBPocEqjB
This is so much fun. I absolutely love this channel. Thank you so much for sharing.
Thanks for the encouragement! I am excited to share more
Nice video
Thanks! I can't wait to show more
You do it (and well) so we don't have to. Nice experiements.
thanks! My goal is to shed some light on these processes that are considered impossible for hobbyists
this shit is crazy. looking forward to the next steps in your semiconductor journey
Gonna hopefully have a video on diffusion out soon!
Never change!
I hope to get better though ;)
I don't expect the majority of viewers to be handling silicon wafers on daily basis, so it's probably worth explaining in greater detail why that straight line fracturing thing works the way it does. for example, are cracks always aligned with the lattice? how do you know its direction? or are cracks simply perpendicular to the nearest edge?
I will make a video about the basics of semiconductors pretty soon (hopefully) that will cover all the topics that don't really fit in other videos
Awesome video. Looking forward to next one...
Thanks! more to come shortly (in a couple weeks i think)
A simple diode array spectrometer, light source and some fibers would enable you to record the spectral reflectance of the surface and determine the thickness more precisely.
Yeah, In the future when I need more accurate measurements I might try something like this
Idiot here, so take these comments with a massive amount of skepticism:
I just watched the build video for the oven. Something that might be worth while is to add a few thermocouples to the outside of the heater (S, R, or B should work). This would allow you to monitor the temperature gradient throughout the oven.If you added more SSRs and zones that would help with the graident as well. It might also be possible to correlate external thermocouples with the internal thermocouple to get a good enough temperature which would remove the need to have the thermocouple in the way of your work.
Your steam is likely adding a huge temperature drop to your process. It might be worth trying to superheat the steam by putting a couple helixes into the glass and putting a flame on that. The steam is likely also creating a venturi, drawing cold air into the system. Could you put a plug on the steam side so it can't do that? Also, would it be worth plugging the other side with something to reduce the amount of air exchange? Maybe a cotton ball size piece of insulation would do it while remaining porous enough to still allow the water vapor through unimpeded.
Just subscribed. Looking forward to future videos. Great work.
Yeah- more thermocouples and also maybe different heating zones would definitely improve things
Even in your furnace you CAN load the chips vertically, they are small enough. You need a vertical capable boat. Something like a dishwasher rack boat.
.
Since Sam Altman said he needed 7 trillion USD to buy chips, chips are not niche anymore.
wow excellent!!, I'm looking forward to your first transistor
Me too lol! It's gonna be a little while. I've got a few process videos I have to make first
8:21 wow. That is spectacular
i love all the colors :)
This was really cool! Thanks for the video!
Man this is wild. I'm loving this stuff. I'll probably never recreate this but if the apocalypse happens and someone hands me an iPhone to reverse engineer I'll be able to explain why I'm not able to do that.
Same here lol :)
I really love your voice and the content is top notch, thank you for the wonderful channel.
thank you for the compliment- I do my best :)
the wafer is still dirty... look at the Apllied Science Video on solvents and the water-break test... super cool video and actually quite easy to implement for an amazing result
don't worry, i'm going to use better cleaning methods once i am working on processes where the wafer needs to be perfect. for basic fabrication steps like oxide growth and lithography a simple scrub and rinse is sufficient
Amazingly Intelligent. Thank you.
Great job! Your explanations of whats going on are great. Cant wait for next video!
Thank you! It means a lot that others are interested in this weird niche topic
Might build one myself
when started to watch this video you had 9.99k subscribers, after I watched it (and enjoyed) I subscribed and now you have 10K. Well, I dont know if I'm the exact 10Kth subscriber but hey CONGRATS ON 10K! ☺
Thank you! It's a real milestone and i'm humbled that so many people are interested in my hobby. I'll see you at 100k ;)
You could track the steam production by putting the hotplate on a scale and monitoring the rate of weight loss. Only steam that actually leaves will reduce the weight. You might be able to automate this in a similar way to your oven controller, controlling the average wattage to produce a target grams-lost/time. The biggest hurdle is that strain gauge precision is a factor of load magnetude; I'm not sure you can practically maintain gram precision while holding up that hot plate, then you also have to hold the flask, the glass balls, and the water.
I was thinking i might better control the steam generation rate by dripping water at a set rate into a heating element connected to the tube. i figure that is probably workable
@@projectsinflight Will it be fine for the steam to be pulsed like that?
always nice to see peopel making chips at home!
Thanks!
I was happily watching your video till 3:49 where you pulled out an air nozzle and casually used it to dispense water.
I'm in the process of making something better. Right now though the water quality isn't being substantially affected by the nozzle, and there aren't any leaks, so I've kept it as-is
Wow great video keep up the good work
Thanks! I am excited to continue
*BRAVO!* Really Lovely work! - even if i don't understand it all ... i did some. Thanks
Thanks :) Don't feel bad if you don't understand all of it at once- i had to read through a few textbooks and that took a while
Such a cool project! ❤
Thanks! I really appreciate it
best luck im watching u from baghdad
I realy love what you are doing thanks for sharing
IR thermometer to measure your ACTUAL WET oven temps WITH steam... Not your DRY oven temps. 1000c oven air plus "500c steam=Not the temps you think that you think it should be. That "500c" is actually a lot closer to 100c, won't get anywhere close to 500c unless you either pressurize it or Super Heat it, I think it's called "super critical steam". Heat source on water to make steam, run steam through copper (or possible stainless steel) tubing and then apply even more heat again to heat the steam. There are videos about it. The energy it takes for the phase change of water makes it so that the gases phase leaves the surface of the liquid phase at a set 100c, no matter the temperature of the liquid. It looses a lot of energy jumping up into the air. Good rule of thumb... If you can see steam, then it's cooler than 100c because it's just liquid droplets flying through the air and not an actual gas itself.
Great channel with great content. One advice thou, alu foil is weak insulator, try some special heat resistant materials, the white cotton-like one you put your quartz tube seems to be good candidate.
Yeah, i might do that to save on some heating power. I have some other potential ideas as well
Great project and very well done videos - thank you for creating and sharing this content! 👍🏻
Thank you for watching! I never thought so many people would be so interested in a niche topic like this
@@projectsinflight quite the opposite - I’d be absolutely surprised if this series doesn’t become widely watched. This is Ben/Applied Science level! 👏🏻👍🏻
@@projectsinflightI think this channel will take off. Thank you for sharing. So fun!
veeerry very interesting, I can't wait for the future videos 👀
Great project, great video.
Thanks! I do my best
I am guessing isolating the atmosphere in the tube furnace would also fairly dramatically improve the repeatability of growing oxide films (or any reactive films, really).
I'll be testing that when I upgrade the tube furnace. That being said, i've actually gotten good results with diffusion so far even without plugging the ends.
Keep it coming this is great.
I might try a regulated 30% or > hydrogen peroxide drip over a silver substrate catalyst in a sealed properly relieved container plumbed into your tube oven. This could be stable in temperature and steam 2 H2O + O2 output limiting open environment variables. The silver catalyst should be processed and reused.
I'm not familiar with that reaction- 30% H2O2 is pretty energetic stuff
@@projectsinflight It can be. Hydrogen peroxide's chemical formula is H2O2. When it comes into contact with silver, the silver acts as a catalyst. The reaction frees the extra oxygen atom to produce water, and also generates a lot of heat. The heat turns the water into steam. I meant to say
Great work.
Have you thought of making a steam generator using a drip feed onto a hot plate?
An other thought is converting a vape device "Electronic Cigarette"? You would be able to attach one of these to a controller to adjust the steam produced.
yeah as far as I know this is how they do it in industry. I might follow this when i rebuild the oven
@@projectsinflightanother thought if you are making another is to split the heating coil, to spread out the hot spots, not sure how well it would work though.
Not end to end but over-lap them slightly.
Lets think theoretical: if the one you have is hotter in the middle, lets say the middle third is twice the heat of the end thirds.
Then in theory if you had 3 filaments that overlap by a third, then the middle 5/7 should be the same temperature and only 1/7 at each end would be cooler.
Just one of those silly ideas I thought of 😁.
great video!
Thanks! I've got several more coming too
This project is amazing! Looking forward to more videos. In the video the graphics and explanation imply you are growing an oxide layer on top of the silicon chip. Is is not the case that you are converting the top layer of silicon into an oxide layer since the silicon there will react with the oxygen. That would also explain better why the deeper you go the longer it will take. Anyway goodluck with future videos!
Thanks for the encouragement!
Yeah, In the interests of brevity I had to ditch a couple of nuances. It's a hard tradeoff.
You are so great. I am also ready to help you.
Its called dichroic, it was originally used by Nasa if im not mistaken
thank you