The annealing behavior of silicon (oxy)nitride layers, grown by Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition and by Low Pressure Chemical Vapor Deposition, has been studied. The main motivation for this study was the reduction of hydrogen bonds, which are responsible for increased optical losses in silicon oxynitride optical waveguides applied in the third telecommunication window. Since the majority of the integrated optical applications, however, require the exact knowledge of the properties of the waveguide layer (e.g.: refractive index, thickness, material birefringence), the impact of the thermal treatment on those properties has been investigated, too.
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