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Plasma Etching Article Tops Journal’s “Most Read” List for Months
By
Toby Weber
The cover of the 60th anniversary issue of the Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology.
The cover of the 60th anniversary issue of the Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology.

A paper co-written by a University of Houston Cullen College of Engineering professor has stayed at or near the top of the Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology’s “Most Read” list since last fall.

“Plasma Etching: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow,” was authored by professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering Vincent Donnelly, along with Avinoam Kornblit, a consultant and former colleague of Donnelly’s at Bell Labs. It appeared in JVST’s 60th anniversary issue in September of last year.

The piece provides an overview of plasma etching, a method of using chemical reactions to selectively remove very small amounts from the surface of a material in very precise patterns. It is an essential step in the creation of integrated circuits. “Every cell phone, every computer, uses integrated circuits that were built with plasma etching,” Donnelly said.

According to the paper, the first forays into plasma etching took place in the 1960s, and the technology gained traction among academic researchers in the mid 1970s. Businesses then quickly integrated the technique into their manufacturing processes since it eliminated the need to use dangerous, expensive and environmentally harmful acids. Donnelly, who started at Bell Labs in 1979 shortly after earning his Ph.D., was among the early industry researchers to work with plasma etching, and he continues to research the technology to this day.

One reason this paper has proven so popular, Donnelly said, is that no good overview of the field of plasma etching exists. In fact, when teaching students about plasma etching, he himself has been frustrated by the lack of such a resource. There is clearly a demand from many quarters for an overview of the topic. “I’ve gotten a lot of feedback from people in industry in particular who’ve said they really appreciated the article,” Donnelly said.

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