Electroless, Electrolytic and Galvanic Copper Deposition with the Scanning Electrochemical Microscope (SECM)

Abstract

Summary The Scanning Electrochemical Microscope (SECM) can be used with different techniques of microstructured copper deposition. A first approach involves the electrolytic copper deposition on noble metals, whereby copper ions are released from a complex by a suitable tip reaction and then reduced on the polarised conducting surface to form a copper microstructure. The second approach is very similar to the first, but does not involve polarising the substrate. It generates a tip-induced microgalvanic cell, the positive electromotoric force of which is constituted by two electrochemical reactions at different areas of the substrate. Finally the electroless copper deposition is performed on nonconducting surfaces like glass or semiconducting surfaces like silicon. This involves locally reducing a suitable precursor film whose surface has been previously immobilised.