Chemical-free cleaning using excimer lasers

A critical requirement in many industrial processes is the cleaning of oils and grease, oxides, solvent residues, particles, thin films and other contaminants from surfaces. There is a particularly acute need in the electronics industry for cleaning semiconductor wafers and computer chips and in the metals industry for removing oxides and other contaminants. Cleaning traditionally is done by various wet chemical processes, almost all consuming large amounts of water and producing large amounts of hazardous wastes. To further complicate this, some of these cleaning agents and vast water consumption are undergoing stringent restrictions. The Radiance ProcessSM is a novel, patented Excimer Laser approach to dry surface cleaning. The process has removed particles from 80 microns to submicron sizes, paints, inks, oxides, fingerprints, hazes, parts of molecules and metallic ions in fingerprints. The process does not ablate, melt or damage the underlying surface. Micro-roughening on some Silicon and Gallium Arsenide is on the order of 1A or less. This paper will discuss the various applications with this process and the latest results from a beta wafer cleaning prototype test bed system that is being built under an EPA grant and joint partnership between Radiance Services Company, Neuman Micro Technologies, Inc. and the Microelectronics Research Laboratory.