The Semiconductor Industry from a Chemical Engineering Perspective

In this talk, a couple of case studies are presented to show how chemical engineering principles can be applied to understand and solve critical issues in semiconductor industry. Two topics, microdefects formation in crystalline silicon and chemical mechanical polishing (CMP), will be covered with more focus on CMP. CMP is a critical and enabling technology in modern semiconductor fabrication. Brief introduction of CMP technology will be covered, then a couple of specific CMP topics will be discussed from a chemical engineering perspective.