Fluorosilicate glass


Fluorosilicate glass is a glass material composed primarily of fluorine, silicon and oxygen. It has a number of uses in industry and manufacturing, especially in semiconductor fabrication where it forms an insulating dielectric. The related fluorosilicate glass-ceramics have good mechanical and chemical properties.

Semiconductor fabrication

Fluorosilicate glass has a low-k dielectric and is used in between copper metal layers during silicon integrated circuit fabrication process. It is widely used by semiconductor foundries on geometries sub 0.25μ.
Fluorosilicate glass is effectively a fluorine-containing silicon dioxide.
Fluorosilicate glass is used by IBM. Intel started using Cu metal layers and FSG on its 1.2 GHz Pentium processor at 130 nm CMOS. TSMC brought in FSG and copper together in the Altera APEX.

Fluorosilicate glass-ceramics

Fluorosilicate glass-ceramics are crystalline or semi-crystalline solids formed by careful cooling of molten fluorosilicate glass. They have good mechanical properties.
Potassium fluororichterite based materials are composed from tiny interlocked rod-shaped amphibole crystals; they have good resistance to chemicals and can be used in microwave ovens. Richterite glass-ceramics are used for high-performance tableware.
Fluorosilicate glass-ceramics with sheet structure, derived from mica, are strong and machinable. They find a number of uses and can be used in high vacuum and as dielectrics and precision ceramic components. A number of mica and mica-fluoroapatite glass-ceramics were studied as biomaterials.