In-vacuum surface flashover of SiN, AlN, and etched SiO 2 thin films at micrometre scales

2025/11/13 by Vijay Kumar, Kumar, Vijay, Martin Siegele-Brown +7 · 1 voice
Engineering · Materials Science · #High voltage insulation and dielectric phenomena #Semiconductor materials and devices #Silicon Nanostructures and Photoluminescence

paper · doi:10.1088/2633-4356/ae57f6

openalex publication_date 2026/03/26 · openalex created_date 2026/03/27 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01

Abstract

Abstract We investigate the surface flashover voltage threshold for SiO 2 , SiN, and AlN thin films over micrometre scale lengths. Furthermore, we test the effects of different etching chemistries on SiO 2 layers. We find that there is little significant difference between untreated SiO 2 samples and those that have been etched with hydrogen fluoride or Transene AlPad Etch 639. SiN and AlN samples performed significantly better than all SiO 2 samples giving a 45% increase in surface flashover voltage at a distance of 5 µ m with the difference increasing with electrode spacing.

Citations

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