RF characterization and isolation properties of mesoporous Si by on-chip coplanar waveguide measurements

Abstract

We report on the broadband electrical characterization of thick mesoporous silicon layers used as RF microplates for on-chip integration of high-Q passive devices in a CMOS-compatible process. To measure the RF losses of the microplate we have fabricated several designs of Coplanar Waveguides (CPWs), for form-factors relevant to the sizes of on-chip passive RF devices, on thick mesoporous Si layers (RF microplates) of various thicknesses, and we compared the results with those obtained from similar CPWs integrated directly on the p-type Si substrate. For maximum measurement sensitivity of the loss, the CPWs were designed to be very good transmission lines matched to 50Ω port impedances. We also characterized the grown mesoporous Si by performing electromagnetic simulations of the structure and identifying the measured and simulated S-parameters over a broadband frequency region, for the appropriate simulator input of complex permittivity. The measured results show that, for CPW features commensurate with the scale of on-chip RF passive devices, a 50-μm-thick mesoporous Si layer on the Si substrate reduces the losses to 1/6th–1/4th of the values corresponding to a p-type Si substrate, showing that mesoporous Si is an excellent material for CMOS-compatible on-chip integration of high-Q passive devices.