Glossary

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An exposure tool that employs scanning exposure method moving both stages of reticle and wafer.
It is also called step & scan because the wafer stage steps after every scanning exposure.
It is common to reduce the patter of reticle (Photomask) by 1/4 on wafer, and scan inversely to the wafer stage.

Scanning Laser Microscope

In an ordinary microscope, a sample is illuminated by a uniform light and the reflected or transmitted, or scattered light is to provide image through objective and imaging lenses and the image is directly observed by a naked eye through an eyepiece lens.
On the other hand, in a scanning laser microscope, the beam spot of laser out of the light source is narrowed down to the size equivalent to its wavelength and the beam of this spot size is scanned two dimensionally on the sample surface.
The reflected light from the sample is detected by a light detector.
The time series detector output is sampled in synchronization with two dimensional scanning and an image is generated by rearranging the signal two dimensionally.
The signal output at certain moment originates only to the light from a certain point on the sample where beam spot is irradiating at that certain moment and an image of high contrast is obtained, accordingly.

See-through Type Solar Cell

Process a part of thin film silicon Solar cell with a laser to eliminate about 10% of the whole film to make the Solar cell see-through

SEM

Scanning Electron Microscope
A microscope that uses electron beam

SEMATECH

A semiconductor manufacturing technology research consortium inaugurated in 1987 mainly promoted by Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) in the US. The headquarters is located in Austin.

Semiconductor

Material characterized by its intermediate electrical property which lies between that of "conductor" in which current flows well and that of "insulator" in which current does not flow at all.
Or, electronic circuit made of semiconductor materials.

SF (Stacking Fault)

Abbreviation of stacking fault which is one kind of crystal defect. Stacking fault influences junction leak characteristics under device formation

Short-Circuit Current

The maximum current at zero voltage. This value is directly proportional to the incident light intensity.

Silicon

The element occupying the second highest proportion among all the elements on the globe, following Oxygen which occupies the highest proportion.

Single Crystal

Crystal is a structure forming space lattice within itself, made of atom or molecule arrayed with a certain periodicity.
When such periodicity is formed all through the crystal, the crystal is called single crystal.

Single Crystal Solar Cell

A Solar Cell made of a single crystal wafer. Although it is costly, high efficiency Solar Cell can be fabricated because the crystallynity is very high.

SMIF

Standard Mechanical InterFace
Storage case for Photomask and wafer
"SMIF" is the registered brand of Assyst Technologies Inc.
http://www.asyst.co.jp/index.html

S/N ratio

Signal to Noise Ratio

SOI

Silicon On Insulator
A wafer which has thin Si crystal layer on insulator

Solar Cell

A semiconductor device that converts light to electricity. Conversion of light to electricity utilizes effects of semiconductor characteristics.

Solar Cell Array

A group of Solar Cell modules installed outdoors in the most suitable alignment.

Solar Cell Unit

Basic unit of Solar Cell. Solar Cell itself is also called Cell.

Solar Simulator

A solar simulator is a device that provides illumination approximating natural sunlight.

Spherical Silicon Solar Cell

A light condensing type solar cell made of spherical silicon. Thanks to light condensing function, production costs are lower because smaller amount of silicon is necessary.

Sputtering

To form a film on a wafer by sputtering metal electron by bombarding Argon ion on an ingot that is called target.

Stepper

Exposure tool for transferring (exposing) electronic circuit pattern on a photomask to a substrate (Wafer, FPD), and the tool employs step & repeat procedure for the exposing.
Typical reduction ratio of the transferring is 1/5 or 1/4, but there are other reduction ratios.

Stitching error

Stitching error between shots and fields during EB lithography

Stress Liner Film

A film that is formed on a wafer aiming to generate local strain near the transistor gate. This film is used to improve transistor characteristics

Sunlight Spectrum

Sunlight consists of light of continuous wavelength with corresponding intensity, which can be expressed with a distribution diagram of wavelength versus intensity.

Surface Electrode

An electrode formed on the cell surface in the configuration not to shade the sun light most effectively to extract current