There is growing interest in using micromachining technology to create microphones.

MEMS
based microphones offer good dimensional control, miniaturization, direct integration with onchip
electronics, arrayed format, and potentially low cost due to batch processing. Piezoelectric
microphones using diaphragms made of silicon nitride, silicon, and even organic thin film (e.g.,
Parylene [29]) has been made. On-chip integrated signal-conditioning circuitry has shown unamplified
sensitivity of 0.92 mV/Pa [8]. Let us review two cases. Case 7.3 focuses on a membrane
type acoustic sensor with PZT as the transduction material. Case 7.4 is a cantilever-type
acoustic sensor using ZnO. Both sensors are made using bulk micromachining material.
Case 7.3 PZT Piezoelectric Acoustic Sensor
Bernstein and colleagues described the use of an array of piezoelectric transducers as an
underwater acoustic imager [3]. The imager is akin to a CCD imager for optics. It consists
of an 8 by 8 array of acoustic imaging sites.The cross-sectional view of each site is shown in
Figure 7.7. A layer of piezoelectric material—sol-gel deposited lead zirconate titanate
(PZT), lies on tops of a silicon micromachined diaphragm. The size of each membrane
varies from 0.2 to 2 mm.
Two electrodes sandwich a PZT thin film. The fabriation process is noteworthy because
it involves the use of sol-gel deposition of piezoelectric materials. After oxidizing the
silicon wafers (Figure 7.8a) and patterning the oxide, a heavy boron dose was diffused in
all but the oxide protected areas where through-wafer cavities would later be deposited
(Figure 7.8b). All remaining oxide is removed. A layer of low temperature oxide (LTO) is
deposited using the LPCVD method. A 50-nm-thick Ti and 300-nm-thick Pt layer are deposited
as the bottom electrode, with the Ti serving to increase the adhesion between the Pt
and oxide (Figure 7.8c). This was followed by deposition of PZT by spinning on a sol-gel
mixture of lead acetate trihydrate, zirconium n-propoxide and titanium isoproposide in a
glacial acetic acid solvent.The sol-gel material is spun on, dried at to remove the solvent,
heated at 400_C to remove residual organics, and preannealed at 600_C to densify the layer and prevent further
shrinkage (Figure 7.8d). Detailed receipe for making the sol-gel
solutoin can be found in the paper.The PZT material is poled at room temperature at 36 V
DC bias for 2 minutes, to yield a resulting PZT film with a relative permitivity of 1400 and
of 246 pC/N.
The PZT film is patterned by wet etching PZT in a solutoin containing buffered hydrogen
fluoride (BHF) and hydrochloric acid (HCl) (Figure 7.8e).The BHF is a mixture of
aqueous ammonium fluoride and acqueous hydrogen fluoride (HF) [31]. The top
electrode is separated from the ZnO by a -thick polyimide dielectric layer.This is followed
by the deposition of a top electrode and its patterning (Figure 7.8f). The backside
cavity is produced in anisotropic etchant, with the frontside tempoerarily protected by a silicone
elastomer cover (Figure 7.8g). Prior to silicon etching, the LTO oxide on the backside
is first removed.
Case 7.4 PZT Piezoelectric Microphone
A second example is a piezoelectric cantilever microphone and microspeaker [9]. This example
is selected because of its unique transduction principle, the choice of ZnO as material,
and the involvement of wet and dry silicon etching in one process flow.
Earlier work in Case 7.3 uses micromachined diaphragms that are clamped on all
four sides. Cantilever microphones are chosen here because of the compliance (Figure 7.9).
The cantilever is also free from any residue-stress induced on a membrane. The authors
stated that the use of a cantilever actually created a microphone with great sensitivity
( bar at 890 Hz, the resonant frequency). Conversely, acoustic output can be
generated when the device is used as an actuator, with a sound pressure level of 75 dB at
890 Hz with 4 V (zero-to-peak) drive.
The size of the cantilever is 2 mm by 2 mm, with the overall thickness being A
ZnO thin film is located on the cantilever. The fabrication begins with a -oriented
silicon wafer.A -thick oxide is grown by thermal oxidation, followed by the LPCVD
deposition of a -thick silicon nitride.The nitride is deposited at and 300 mTorr
deposition pressures from a vapor with a 6:1 ratio of dichlorosilane (DCS, ) to
ammonia. An anisotropic silicon etch is performed on the backside of the wafer until the
silicon oxide is reached.The membrane is rather large and thin. Care must be exercised when
conducting further processing on the front side of the wafer.To provide sufficient strength to
the membrane to survive the remainder of chemical processes, a second -thick LPCVD
nitride layer is deposited on both side of the silicon wafer, with a reaction gas ratio of 4:1.
A -thick LPCVD polysilicon electrode is deposited on the wafer. The front
side of the wafer is coated with spin-on photoresist and patterned.The photoresist serves as
a mask in a plasma etching process to etch the polysilicon. Because the etch rate on silicon
nitride is finite, care must be taken to prevent excessive over etch of the silicon nitride. Fortunately,
two coatings of silicon nitride (with a total thickness of ) are present on the
front side. The front side is then coated with a LPCVD low temperature oxide (LTO), an
insulating layer.The wafer is annealed for 25 min at 950_C to reduce stress to relieve stress and activate dopants in
the polysilicon. A -thinck layer of ZnO is deposited using
RF-magnetron sputtering. The ZnO is then encapsulated with another layer of LTO
( thick). Contact windows are made at the contact pad sites.
Next a layer of aluminum is deposited by sputtering and photolithographically patterned.
The wafer is then diced into individual dies. Because the dicing process involves
vacuum on the backside for holding the wafer and running water on the front side for removing
particles and heat, the membrane are subjected to rather harsh conditions. Optionally,
a 0.5-mm-thick aluminum thin film can be deposited on the backside to further
strengthen the membrane during this step. At the die level, the LTO, nitride, and the aluminum
on the membrane are patterned using HF, plasma etch, and a wet etchant containing
K3Fe(CN)6 and KOH, respectively.