Process 

In the semiconductor industry, oxygen, nitrogen, argon, helium, ammonia, ammonia dioxide, carbon tetrachloride and various di-, tri- hydrides sourced from the air, natural gases and petrochemical residual gases from ammonia plants for refining. Based on the gases’ source, impurity content, purity requirements, an applicable filtration process can be chosen.

After formation of integrated circuits (IC) to megabits, more stringent cleaning is required through usage of ultrapure or ionized gas supply. An air filter is necessary before application to remove particles caused by vibrations or impact.

Problem 

With its highly integrated semiconductor components, electronic pathways on these chips becomes finer, with 16kb bands having spaces between 4 to 7 microns and 265kb circuits having spaces between 0.8 to 1.5 microns. These chips require extremely precise particle sizes for processing, which are 1/5 to 1/10 of the desired particle size for manufacturing. As such, 0.3 micron particles for 64kb chips and 0.1 micron particles for 256kb-1Mb chips are undesirable. Almost all processes in the semiconductor manufacturing industry uses ultra-pure gases, with emphasis on the gases’ purity.

Applications

Depth Filtration

• Glass Fiber Filter Paper

• Ceramic Sheets

• Sintered Metal

• Asbestos

• Felt

Membrane Filtration

• Metal Screens (Demisters)

• Teflon Membrane

• Ceramic Membrane