Dendritic Materials as a Dry Release Sacrificial Layer
Various test devices were successfully fabricated using the developed process to demonstrate a dry sacrificial etching technique. An array of cantilever beams 100 mum in width by 1000 mum in length was successfully released in 10 min. In addition, an array of microchannels was fabricated to better understand the limitations of HB560 decomposition. A full 1-cm-long microchannel with longitudinal aspect ratio of 16 600 was successfully realized in 10 min. A comparison study with other techniques shows that HB560 etching is on the order of 200 times faster than a 49% HF wet etching techniques used in MEMS fabrication. A published process with a faster etch rate could not be found. In order to demonstrate the large sacrificial etching capabilities of HB560 as well as its unique material characteristics, a microblister pack chamber, 5000 mum in diameter and nearly 2 cm in length, was successfully fabricated. A lateral aspect ratio of 8300 and a longitudinal aspect ratio of 31 000 were achieved and described in Chapter 5. Chapter 6 summarizes the thesis with discussions pertaining to future work.
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