Adhesive Bonding

Adhesive bonding (also referred to as gluing or glue bonding) describes a wafer bonding technique with applying an intermediate layer to connect substrates of different materials. These produced connections can be soluble or insoluble. The commercially available adhesive can be organic or inorganic and is deposited on one or both substrate surfaces. Adhesives especially the wide established SU-8 and Benzocyclobuten (BCB) are specialized for MEMS or electronic component production.

The procedure enables bonding temperatures from 1000 °C down to room temperature. The most important process parameters for achieving a high bonding strength are:

  • adhesive material
  • coating thickness
  • bonding temperature
  • processing time
  • chamber pressure
  • tool pressure

Adhesive bonding has the advantage of relatively low bonding temperature as well as the absence of electric voltage and current. Based on the fact that the wafers are not in direct contact, this procedure enables the use of different substrates, e.g. silicon, glass, metals and other semiconductor materials. A drawback is that small structures become wider during patterning what hampers the production of an accurate intermediate layer with tight dimension control. Further, the possibility of corrosion due to out-gassed products, thermal instability and penetration of moisture limits the reliability of the bonding process. Another disadvantage is the missing possibility of hermetically sealed encapsulation due to higher permeability of gas and water molecules while using organic adhesives.

Read more about Adhesive Bonding:  Overview, Technical Specifications

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