A novel technology to form self-aligned emitter ledge for heterojunction bipolar transistors

We have proposed and successfully demonstrated a novel and simple process to fabricate self-aligned emitter passivation ledges for heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs) without using additional dielectric etch masks or dual etch-stop layers in the emitter. In this new ledge formation process, the emitter ledges are fabricated by the formation of photoresist sidewall spacers followed by a wet-chemical etch process. The effectiveness of this new ledge formation technology has been confirmed in AlGaAs/GaAs HBTs. Since the proposed ledge technology is very simple and without using any etch-stop layers (thus independent of material systems), it appears to be very promising for HBT fabrication.