Ultra Thin Mikrochips
The Institute for Microelectronics Stuttgart (IMS CHIPS) has developed what they claim to be as, the worlds thinnest silicon chips in cooperation with the University of Stuttgart Silicon wafers typically have a thickness of 1 millimetre in order to provide sufficient mechanical stability and stiffness for reliable processability in automated silicon process lines. Recently, there has been great interest in extremely thin chips for applications to three-dimensional circuits (3D chips), to electronics on flexible foil, in paper or on textile (e.g. RF tags), to power electronics and the fabrication of ultra small chips (smart dust). The conventional fabrication of thin chips is based on grinding and polishing of the entire silicon wafer followed by dicing out the chips. Such processing enables minimum chip thickness of typically 200 micrometer.
IMS CHIPS has reached a breakthough by developing a technology to realize chips with a thickness of 20 micrometer and below in an industrial manufacturing process. IMS CHIPS use a technique that forms cavities under the chips-to-be at a distance of a few micrometers beneath the wafer surface prior to the integration of the electronic circuitry. The chips are broken off the wafer surface rather than being diced from thinned wafers. This allows for reducing the chip thickness to 20 micrometer and below, i.e. by more than an order of magnitude in comparison to the conventional processing. Moreover, the remainder of the silicon wafer can be recycled, thus leading to substantial cost reduction.
