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The paper investigates sliding friction of the α-Al2O3/α-Al2O3 and α-Fe2O3/α-Fe2O3 contacts by using the spring interfacial potential. It is found that at micronscale the friction properties of the oxides are almost independent of the coarse-graining and are the same in the different sliding directions. Even the hardness contacts friction coefficient shows a decrease with increasing intensity of the normal component of the interfacial interaction force. This result is as an implementation for the previous observations of sliding friction of various materials that showed that a drop of friction coefficient with increasing externally applied normal load has originated from deformation of interfaces or occurrence of debris at contact, indicating an unsteady contact.

Catalyst-referred etching (CARE) is an abrasive-free and damage-free polishing method that involves applying a catalytic reaction at the contact point of the catalyst surface and workpiece in a chemical solution. An atomically flat silicon carbide (SiC) wafer surface can be obtained by the CARE process. Recently, it was found that water can be used as a chemical solution, even in the case of SiC polishing. However, its current removal rate of 4H-SiC (0001) 4°off-axis substrate is only 2 nm/h and is expected to increase. In this study, the use of photoelectrochemical oxidation in combination with the CARE process using water was investigated, successfully increasing the removal rate up to approximately 100 nm/h.

Daisetsu Toh, Pho Van Bui, Ai Isohashi, Satoshi Matsuyama, Kazuto Yamauchi, and Yasuhisa Sano, "An abrasive-free chemical polishing method assisted by nickel catalyst generated by in situ electrochemical plating", Review of Scientific Instruments 91, 045108 (2020), https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5141381., An abrasive-free polishing method using water and a Pt catalyst, called catalyst-referred etching (CARE), has been developed for the finishing of optical and semiconductor surfaces. This method realizes well-ordered surfaces with a smoothness of several tens of picometers without crystallographic disturbance. In this study, we propose a new CARE method using a Ni catalyst with in situ electrochemical plating and dissolution, which enable enhancing the catalytic capability of Ni. This method has advantages to realize more than ten times higher removal rate and better stability compared with the conventional CARE method.

A catalytically assisted etching system was developed for the ultra-precision fabrication of optical components, such as X-ray mirrors and extreme-ultraviolet mask blanks. This study demonstrates that an atomically smooth surface with a sub-Angstrom root-mean-square roughness could be achieved on a SiO

Catalyst-referred etching (CARE) is a planarization method based on the chemical etching reaction, which does not need abrasives. In this paper, CARE was applied to the planarization of 6-inch silicon carbide (SiC) wafers, and removal properties were investigated. The etching rate was about 20nm/h, which is almost equal to that of 2-inch SiC wafer (16 nm/h). The rms roughness was reduced along with the removal depth, and step-terrace structure was observed in whole area of the on-axis wafer surface.

Daisetsu Toh, Pho Van Bui, Ai Isohashi, Naotaka Kidani, Satoshi Matsuyama, Yasuhisa Sano, Yoshitada Morikawa, and Kazuto Yamauchi, "Catalyzed chemical polishing of SiO2 glasses in pure water", Review of Scientific Instruments 90, 045115 (2019), https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5090320., A catalytically assisted etching system was developed for the ultra-precision fabrication of optical components, such as X-ray mirrors and extreme-ultraviolet mask blanks. This study demonstrates that an atomically smooth surface with a sub-Angstrom root-mean-square roughness could be achieved on a SiO2 glass substrate using pure water and Pt as the etching solution and catalyst, respectively. Density functional theory calculations confirmed that the mechanistic pathway was involved in catalyzed hydrolysis. The significant roles of the catalyst were clarified to be the dissociation of water molecules and the stabilization of a meta-stable state, in which a hypervalent silicate state is induced, and the Si-O backbond is elongated and loosened. To confirm the role of the catalyst, the Pt metal was replaced by Au, and the observed drastic difference in the removal rate was attributed to the degree of stabilization of the metastable state.

In this study, a gallium nitride (GaN) substrate grown by the Na flux method was processed by catalyst-referred etching (CARE). CARE process for GaN involves two-step: the first step uses the photoelectrochemical process (PEC-CARE) and the second step applies a platinum (Pt) catalyst (Pt-CARE). PEC-CARE can produce a highly ordered GaN (0001) surface. The surface roughness was 0.638 nm root-mean-square (rms). Pt-CARE can produce an atomically flat surface with a step-terrace structure on the entire surface. The surface roughness was 0.113 nm rms. The removal rates of PEC-CARE and Pt-CARE were found to be 45.5 and 5.5 nm/h, respectively.

A novel abrasive-free polishing method called catalyst-referred etching (CARE) has been developed. CARE can be used to chemically planarize a silicon carbide (SiC) surface with an etching agent activated by a catalyst. Platinum (Pt) and hydrofluoric (HF) acid are used as the catalyst and etchant, respectively. CARE can produce an atomically flat and crystallographically highly ordered surface of 4HSiC (0001) with a root-mean-square roughness of less than 0.1 nm regardless of the cut-off angle. However, industrial use of CARE is difficult because of HF acid usage. In this study, pure water was investigated as an alternative etchant to HF acid. We examined CARE using pure water by applying it to the planarization of a 4HSiC substrate and observed a feasible performance. The removal mechanism is considered to be the dissociative adsorption of water molecules to the SiC bonds of the topmost Si atom, namely the hydrolysis of the back bond, and the catalysis of Pt is considered to enhance the reaction. CARE with pure water is expected to represent a breakthrough method for surface processing of SiC, and will be widely applied in industrial processes such as planarization after high temperature processing in device fabrication.

In this study, we developed aA novel abrasive-free polishing method called the catalyst-referred etching (CARE) has been developed. CARE can chemically remove SiC chemically with using an etching agent activated by a catalyst. Platinum and hydrofluoric (HF) acid are used for the planarization of SiC substrates as a catalyst and etchant, respectively. CARE can produce an atomically flat surface of 4H–SiC (0001) with a root-mean-square roughness of less than

A comprehensive study of the physicochemical interactions and the reaction mechanism of SiC etching with water by Pt catalysts can reveal key details about the surface treatment and catalytic phenomena at interfaces. Therefore, density functional theory simulations were performed to study the kinetics of Pt-assisted water dissociation and breaking of a Si–C bond compared to the HF-assisted mechanism. These calculations carefully considered the elastic and chemical interaction energies at the Pt–SiC interface, activation barriers of Si–C bond dissociation, and the catalytic role of Pt. It was found that the Pt-catalyzed etching of SiC in water is initiated via hydrolysis reactions that break the topmost Si–C bonds. The activation barrier strongly depends on the elastic and chemical interactions. However, chemical interactions are a dominant factor and mainly contribute to the lowering of the activation barrier, resulting in an increased rate of reaction.

A novel abrasive-free planarization method named catalyst-referred etching (CARE) was developed. In this method, a polishing pad coated by a catalytic material is used. During the processing, topmost areas of the work substrate, which contacts most frequently with the catalytic material, are preferentially etched off through the catalytically induced chemical reaction. This paper reviews the CARE method from the viewpoints of the equipment configuration and applicability to single crystalline 4H-SiC and GaN substrates and reports that an atomically well-ordered surface with a step-and-terrace structure was observed over the whole area of the 2 inch substrate. The height of the step was a single bilayer. In addition, The CARE was applied to oxidized materials of ZnO and sapphire and can also smoothen the surfaces to be the similar to those of 4H-SiC and GaN substrates.

In this study, a gallium nitride (GaN) substrate produced by the Na flux method was planarized using catalyst-referred etching (CARE). To improve the removal rate, the GaN substrate was processed using CARE-assisted photoelectrochemical (PEC) reaction (PEC CARE); the removal rate was 45 nm/h. However, the shape was embossed because of subsurface scratches introduced during preprocessing. These scratches were removed when the PEC CARE process was conducted under an applied potential of 2.5 V. In addition, a smooth surface of surface roughness 0.4 nm rms was obtained. A surface with step-terrace structures on the entire substrate was subsequently obtained when the CARE process was performed using a platinum (Pt) catalyst and deionized water; in this case, the surface roughness was 0.11 nm rms and the removal rate was 5 nm/h.

Catalyst-referred etching (CARE) is a noble planarization method which does not require abrasives. In this paper, we applied CARE with pure water to a 4H-SiC substrate in order to evaluate the removal rate and the surface roughness of the processed surface. The removal rate for the 4H-SiC(0001) on-axis wafer was found to be 2 nm/h while, in the AFM images, step-terrace structures were clearly observed on the processed surface.

P. V. Bui, A. Isohashi, H. Kizaki, Y. Sano, K. Yamauchi, Y. Morikawa, and K. Inagaki, "Study on the mechanism of platinum-assisted hydrofluoric acid etching of SiC using density functional theory calculations", Appl. Phys. Lett. 107, 201601 (2015) https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4935832., Hydrofluoric acid (HF) etching of the SiC surface assisted by Pt as a catalyst is investigated using density functional theory. Etching is initiated by the dissociative adsorption of HF on step-edge Si, forming a five-fold coordinated Si moiety as a metastable state. This is followed by breaking of the Si-C back-bond by a H-transfer process. The gross activation barrier strongly correlates with the stability of the metastable state and is reduced by the formation of Pt-O chemical bonds, leading to an enhancement of the etching reaction.

We used catalyst-referred etching, which is an abrasive-free planarization method, to produce an extremely smooth surface on a 4H-SiC substrate. However, the removal rate was lower than that obtained by chemical mechanical polishing, which is the planarization method generally used for SiC substrates. To improve the removal rate, we investigated its dependence on rotational velocity and processing pressure. We found that the removal rate increases in proportion to both rotational velocity and processing pressure. A lapped 4H-SiC substrate was planarized under conditions that achieved the highest removal rate of approximately 500 nm/h. A smooth surface with a root-mean square roughness of less than 0.1 nm was fabricated within 15 min. Because the surface, which was processed under conditions of high rotational velocity and high processing pressure, consisted of a step–terrace structure, it was well ordered up to the topmost surface.