Etching characteristics and mechanism of vanadium dioxide in inductively coupled Cl2/Ar plasma

An investigation of a VO2 etch mechanism in Cl-2/Ar inductively coupled plasma under the condition of low ion bombardment energy is carried out. It is found that an increase in Ar mixing ratio results a nonmonotonic VO2 etch rate, which reaches a maximum of 70 to 80 nm/min at 70 to 75% Ar. The model-based analysis of the etch mechanism shows that the VO2 etch kinetics correspond to the ion-flux-limited etch regime. This is most likely due to the domination of low volatile VCl3 and/or VCl2 in the reaction products. (C) 2009 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. [DOI: 10.1117/1.3100423]