US Patent Issued to Praxair Technology on Dec. 9 for "Methods for gas phase selective etching of silicon-germanium layers" (New York, North Carolina, California Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Dec. 9 -- United States Patent no. 12,494,374, issued on Dec. 9, was assigned to Praxair Technology Inc. (Danbury, Conn.).

"Methods for gas phase selective etching of silicon-germanium layers" was invented by Ashwini K. Sinha (East Amherst, N.Y.), Ce Ma (Apex, N.C.), Aaron Reinicker (Cary, N.C.) and Atul M. Athalye (San Marcos, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Methods for selectively etching SiGe relative to Si are provided. Some of the methods incorporate formation of a passivation layer on a surface of the Si layer to enhance SiGe etchant selectivity and the use of interhalogen gases that preferentially etch the SiGe as opposed to the Si in the presence of the passivat...