High-Q above-IC inductors and transmission lines - comparison to Cu back-end performance

Author

Carchon, G.J. ; Sun, X. ; De Raedt, W.

Author_Institution

Microwave & RF Syst. Group, IMEC, Heverlee, Belgium

Volume

1

fYear

2004

fDate

1-4 June 2004

Firstpage

1118

Abstract

In the current trend towards portable applications, high-Q integrated inductors have gained considerable importance. In this paper, wafer level packaging techniques have been used to integrate state of the art high-Q on-chip inductors on top of a five-levels-of-metal (5LM) Cu damascene back-end of line (BEOL) silicon process using 20Ω.cm Si wafers. The inductors are realized above the on-chip passivation layer using thick post-processed low-k dielectric BCB (benzo-cyclobutene) and electroplated Cu layers. The performance of the inductors is compared to inductors with identical lateral dimensions realized in the BEOL using different comparison criteria: Q_L and Q_BW (single ended as well as differential excitation) and maximum available gain (G_max). Next to inductors, high quality above-IC transmission lines have been realized in the WLP layers.

Keywords

Q-factor; coplanar waveguides; copper; dielectric thin films; inductors; integrated circuit metallisation; integrated circuit packaging; metallic thin films; microstrip lines; BEOL; CPW; Cu-Si; WLP layers; above-IC transmission lines; benzo-cyclobutene; damascene back-end of line process; electroplated Cu layers; high-Q above-IC inductors; integrated inductors; on-chip inductors; on-chip passivation layer; post-processed low-k dielectric BCB; thin-film microstrip lines; wafer level packaging techniques; Dielectrics; Energy loss; Frequency; Inductors; Parasitic capacitance; Performance loss; Q factor; Silicon; Spirals; Transmission lines;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Electronic Components and Technology Conference, 2004. Proceedings. 54th

Print_ISBN

0-7803-8365-6

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/ECTC.2004.1319481

Filename

1319481