New opportunities for China's chipsThe Chinese Academy of Sciences' semiconductor "hybrid rice" bypasses lithography machine technology
In the post-Moore era, the traditional pursuit of the largest chip size will require higher and higher requirements for manufacturing equipment, and it may be difficult to exceed the limits of Moore's Law in the future. As a result, industry researchers will be investigating new processes, new architectures, and new materials to explore a completely new path forward.
For example, the Chinese Academy of Sciences is exploring semiconductors"Hybrid rice"technology, which is also one of the research directions. The Chinese Academy of Sciences is researching"Hybrid rice"Will technology change the path for chips to overcome new opportunities?
Research by the Chinese Academy of Sciences"Hybrid rice"Semiconductor technology.
Hybrid rice"Semiconductor technology, the academic name is:"Heterogeneous integration technology for compound semiconductors", obtained by heterobond synthesis or epitaxial growth, will be composed of different device processing nodes or high-performance compound semiconductor wafers and low-cost silicon-based highly integrated device wafers. Integrated device wafers are integrated with each other.
The combination of these materials with different functions, combining the respective advantages of compound semiconductors and silicon, through the interaction of complementary, complementary and heterogeneous materials, produces more excellent physical properties such as electrical, optical, acoustic and thermal, and can obtain photonics and electronic devices with higher power, higher frequency and higher speed.
This technical method improves the performance of hybrid rice and other devices from the perspective of material innovation, and takes advantage of the cultivation advantages of complementary varieties, so this technology is also called in semiconductors"Hybrid rice"Technology.
At present, Tian Gui's team of the Chinese Academy of Sciences is in"Hybrid rice"Based on the technology, XOI heterogeneous integrated materials using compound semiconductors such as indium phosphide, gallium nitride, and gallium oxide are being developed. In addition, he developed helium-hydrogen ion co-implantation technology for more efficient removal of indium phosphide films and developed a 4-inch silicon-based indium phosphide heterogeneous integrated wafer.
You Tiangui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Is this technology a new opportunity beyond chips?
The current semiconductor environment.
At present, integrated circuits mainly use silicon as the substrate material, but silicon materials are close to their physical limits. On the contrary, the Chinese Academy of Sciences is working on compound semiconductors such as indium phosphide, gallium nitride, gallium oxide, etc., which have richer band structures and better electrical and optical properties.
By combining compound semiconductors with silicon, the performance of microelectronic devices can be improved while maintaining the size and process of the original device. As a result, it is no longer necessary to find the end node of the wafer fabrication process, and advanced processing equipment such as lithography and etching machines can be avoided to improve device performance from the perspective of material innovation.
Therefore, the technology itself is a new semiconductor development path, and if the application is mature, it may become a new opportunity for national wafer development.
From the point of view of technological development.
In fact, as early as the 90s of the last century, the industry has been eager for these new materials, exploring the integration of compound semiconductors into silicon, and began to develop heterogeneous compound semiconductor integration technology. However, the heterogeneous integration technology is mainly heteroepitaxial growth, which can only grow specific materials on specific substrates, and it is difficult to realize the heterogeneous integration of different network materials.
Compared with the traditional technology, the team of You Tiangui of the Chinese Academy of Sciences removed the ion beam and transferred the technology to the field of compound semiconductors, transforming it into a general technology for the preparation of compound semiconductor heterogeneous integrated materials. The threshold current density and operating temperature of the devices fabricated by this method have reached the highest international level.
In addition, in terms of heterogeneous material bonding technology, You Tiangui's team has also developed thermal bonding technology. Not only is the technology fully autonomous and controllable, it also reduces the stress caused by temperature increases, and does not require operation in a vacuum environment, making it more suitable for mass production.
In other words, the preparation method of heterogeneous integrated materials developed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences team is more flexible and practical, and the technical level is also the highest at present. In other words, as long as the lane change is successful, overtaking is assured.
From the point of view of application prospects.
Since 2016, compound semiconductors such as indium phosphide and gallium nitride have shined in the international academic and industrial circles. Indium phosphide has an important application prospect in the field of optical communication, and gallium oxide is considered to be a broadband semiconductor material that is expected to reach industrial application after gallium nitride and silicon carbide, and has application prospects in the field of power devices.
It can be seen that compound semiconductors have great development prospects and are likely to become new opportunities for domestic chips to overcome.
In fact, in the field of semiconductors, if the traditional development model is followed, the author believes that it is difficult to keep up with the pace of global advanced semiconductor technology, so go"Overtaking in corners"The road is inevitable. But,"Hybrid rice"The technology of semiconductors has not yet reached the industrial application of new materials, so this road will take some time.
However, the Chinese Academy of Sciences' research team is developing device processes using heterogeneous integrated materials, and everything is moving in the right direction.