Corner Star Limited

Lam Research Corporation

Ii-vi Incorporated

Memc Singapore Pte. Ltd. (uen200614794d)

Silfex, Inc.

Memc Singapore Pte. Ltd.

Jihong John Chen

Dale A Witte

Linda K Swiney

Travis L Hambach

Tirumani N Swaminathan

Avinash K Gupta

Edward Semenas

Thomas E Doane

Susan S Dwyer

Shawn Wesley Hayes

Igor Peidous

Utpal Kumar Chakrabarti

Joseph C Holzer

Ilya Zwieback

Ping Wu

Marcus Getkin

Haresh Siriwardane

Joseph P Doench

George David Stephen Hudelson

Steven M Joslin

Walter R M Stepko

Robert J Purtell

Yi Song

Jiuan Wei

A plasma confinement ring for a plasma chamber comprises a ring-shaped element and a cylindrical element. The ring-shaped element of the plasma confinement ring surrounds a substrate support assembly in the plasma chamber and is arranged along a plane in which a substrate is arranged on the substrate support assembly. The ring-shaped element includes a plurality of orifices. The cylindrical element of the plasma confinement ring extends from an outer edge of the ring-shaped element in a direction perpendicular to the plane in which the substrate is arranged on the substrate support assembly in the plasma chamber. The plasma confinement ring is monolithic.

L-shaped plasma confinement ring for plasma chambers

A system comprises a silicon seed arranged on a pedestal, where the silicon seed is ring shaped and is configured to receive melted silicon at a feed rate to form an ingot, and where the pedestal is configured to rotate at a rotational speed. A controller is configured to, while the silicon seed receives the melted silicon and while the ingot is forming: receive feedback regarding a diameter of the ingot and regarding an angle of a meniscus of the ingot, and control the rotational speed of the pedestal and the feed rate of the melted silicon based on the feedback to control the diameter of the ingot and the angle of the meniscus of the ingot.

Growth of a shaped silicon ingot by feeding liquid onto a shaped ingot

An apparatus for doping a melt of semiconductor or solar-grade material is provided. The apparatus includes a seed chuck, a seed crystal connected to the seed chuck, and a dopant container connected to the seed chuck. The seed chuck defines a first end of the apparatus, and the seed crystal defines a second end of the apparatus. The seed crystal is configured to initiate crystal growth when placed in contact with the melt. The dopant container is positioned between the first end and the second end of the apparatus, and defines a reservoir for holding dopant therein. The dopant container is configured to dispense liquid dopant into the melt when positioned proximate the melt. The dopant container and the seed crystal are connected to the seed chuck simultaneously.

Apparatus and method for doping a semiconductor melt comprising a seed chuck, a seed crystal connected to the seed chuck, and a dopant container connected to the seed chuck between a first and second end of the apparatus

Production of silicon ingots in a crystal puller that involve reduction in the formation of silicon deposits on the puller exhaust system are disclosed.

Methods for reducing deposits in ingot puller exhaust systems

Production of silicon ingots in a crystal puller that involve reduction of the erosion rate at the crucible contact point are disclosed.

Methods for reducing the erosion rate of a crucible during crystal pulling

A method includes providing a first part, a second part and a bonding material between the first part and the second part. The first part and the second part are made of a first material selected from a group consisting of silicon and germanium. The bonding material includes a second material that is different than the first material. The method includes arranging the first part, the bonding material, and the second part in a furnace; and creating a bonded part by heating the first part, the second part and the bonding material to a predetermined temperature for a predetermined period followed by a predetermined solidification period. The predetermined temperature is greater than 1.5 times a eutectic temperature of an alloy including the first material and the second material and less than a melting temperature of the first material.

Low stress bonding of silicon or germanium parts

A method for bonding a first silicon part to a second silicon part includes arranging the first silicon part and the second silicon part in direct physical contact on a surface in a thermal insulating structure; controlling pressure in the thermal insulating structure to a predetermined pressure; controlling temperature in the thermal insulating structure to a predetermined temperature using one or more heaters; and bonding the first silicon part and the second silicon part during a process period. The predetermined temperature is in a temperature range that is greater than or equal to 1335&#xb0; C. and less than 1414&#xb0; C.

Methods for directly bonding silicon to silicon or silicon carbide to silicon carbide

A method of producing rectangular seeds for use in semiconductor or solar material manufacturing includes connecting an adhesive layer to a top surface of a template, the template including a plurality of parallel slots, and drawing alignment lines on the adhesive layer, the alignment lines aligned with at least some of the parallel slots. The method also includes connecting quarter sections to the adhesive layer such that an interface between a rectangular seed portion and a curved wing portion of each quarter section is aligned with at least one of the alignment lines drawn on the adhesive layer, and slicing each of the quarter sections to separate the rectangular seed portions from the curved wing portions.

Methods for producing rectangular seeds for ingot growth

A method of producing rectangular seeds for use in semiconductor or solar material manufacturing includes connecting an adhesive layer to a top surface of a template, the template including a plurality of parallel slots, and drawing alignment lines on the adhesive layer, the alignment lines aligned with at least some of the parallel slots. The method also includes connecting quarter sections to the alignment layer such that an interface between a rectangular seed portion and a curved wing portion of each quarter section is aligned with at least one of the alignment lines drawn on the adhesive layer, and slicing each of the quarter sections to separate the rectangular seed portions from the curved wing portions.

A method of producing rectangular seed bricks for use in semiconductor or solar manufacturing is disclosed. The method includes connecting an alignment layer to a top surface of a template, drawing alignment lines on the alignment layer to demarcate a plurality of nodes, connecting cylindrical rods to the alignment layer such that a center of each rod is aligned with a corresponding node, and slicing through the rods and the alignment layer with a wire web to produce rectangular seed bricks.

Systems and methods for producing seed bricks

In a crystal growth method, a seed crystaland a source materialare provided in spaced relation inside of a growth crucible. Starting conditions for the growth of a crystalin the growth crucibleare then established therein. The starting conditions include: a suitable gas inside the growth crucible, a suitable pressure of the gas inside the growth crucible, and a suitable temperature in the growth cruciblethat causes the source materialto sublimate and be transported via a temperature gradient in the growth crucibleto the seed crystalwhere the sublimated source material precipitates. During growth of the crystalinside the growth crucible, at least one of the following growth conditions are intermittently changed inside the growth cruciblea plurality of times: the gas in the growth crucible, the pressure of the gas in the growth crucible, and the temperature in the growth crucible

SiC single crystals with reduced dislocation density grown by step-wise periodic perturbation technique

A crystal is sublimation grown in a crucible by way of a temperature gradient in the presence of between 1 and 200 Torr of inert gas. The pressure of the inert gas is then increased to between 300 and 600 Torr, while the temperature gradient is maintained substantially constant. The temperature gradient is then reduced and the temperature in the crucible is increased sufficiently to anneal the crystal. Following cooling and removal from the crucible, the crystal is heated in the presence of oxygen in an enclosure to a temperature sufficient to remove unwanted material from the crystal. Following cooling and removal from the enclosure, the crystal surrounded by another instance of the source material is heated in a crucible in the presence 200 and 600 Torr of inert gas to a temperature sufficient to anneal the crystal.

Growing community of inventors

St. Charles, MO, United States of America

Jihong John Chen