Improvement of sidewall surface roughness in silicon-on-insulator rib waveguides

Silicon-on-insulator (SOI) rib waveguides with residual sidewall roughness were fabricated through inductive coupled plasma reactive ion etching (ICPRIE) process. The sidewall surface morphology was characterized by scan electron microscope (SEM), and the root mean square (rms) roughness of the sidewall surface was directly measured by atomic force microscope (AFM). Sidewall surface roughness is the dominant scattering loss source. The ripples on the sidewall surface could be eliminated by mixed ICPRIE, and the rms roughness could be low down to 0.3 nm after thermal oxidation and hf rinse. According to the scattering theory developed by Payne and Lacey, the scattering loss could be minimized to below 0.01 dB/cm. The results indicated that the scattering loss would be a sharp fall by the combination with these two techniques.