Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing 16 (2013) 449453

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Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/mssp

Experimental analysis of galvanic corrosion of a thin

metal lm in a multilayer stack for MEMS application
A. Ravi Sankar a,n, S. Das b
a
b

School of Electronics Engineering, VIT University, Chennai Campus, Chennai 600127, India
School of Medical Science and Technology, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur 721302, India

a r t i c l e i n f o

abstract

Available online 27 August 2012

Experimental analysis of galvanic corrosion of an aluminium (Al)chromium (Cr)gold

(Au) multilayer stack is presented in this paper. The use of two or more stacks of
different metal lms is common for realisation of various microelectromechanical
system (MEMS) devices. However, patterning of the multilayer metal lms by lithographic and etching process is very critical due to galvanic corrosion. In a multilayer
metal stack lm, the knowledge of etch rate of the individual metal layers is very
important for designing the process ow for the fabrication of micro-sensors. In the
present study, galvanic corrosion characteristics of AlCr binary metal stack and AlCrAu
ternary metal stack in different etching solutions have been studied. The intermetallic
contact area and the exposed metal area in the electrolyte solution were varied using an
innovative process step involving silicon shadow mask technique and lithographic process.
It is observed from the experimental results that for an intermetallic contact area to
exposed metal area ratio of 2, etch rate of aluminium layer is increased by more than two
times in aluminium etchant and 80% in Cr etchant as compared to the etch rate of the
aluminium layer without intermetallics effect. The results obtained from this study have
been applied for designing the fabrication ow and successful realisation of a MEMS
piezoresistive accelerometer.
& 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Galvanic corrosion
Multilayer metal stack
MEMS piezoresistive accelerometer
Selective metal deposition
Electroplating
Shadow mask technique

1. Introduction
When two or more different types of metals come into
contact in the presence of an electrolyte, a galvanic couple
is set up due to the difference of electrode potential of
various metals, which leads to galvanic corrosion of the
least noble metal [1]. For various technological applications, the use of two or more layers of different metal
lms is quite common [2,3]. One such example is a
MEMS based silicon piezoresistive accelerometer [3], where
three metal layers, i.e. aluminium (Al), chromium (Cr)

n
Corresponding author. Tel.: 91 44 3993 1274;
fax: 91 44 3993 2555.
E-mail address: a.ravishan@gmail.com (A. Ravi Sankar).

1369-8001/$ - see front matter & 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mssp.2012.08.003

and gold (Au) are used. Aluminium is used for signal

pick-up whereas a gold metal lm is used to increase the
proof mass weight and hence to enhance the performance
of the device [3]. On the other hand, Au lms require
underneath Cr thin lms for better adhesion. Processing of
the three metal lms for the accelerometer fabrication may
lead to galvanic etching of the aluminium lm which is the
least noble metal in the present case. Galvanic metal
etching is inuenced by many parameters like electrode
potential of different metals used, contact and exposed area
of different metals in an electrolyte, properties of the
electrolytes used, temperature of the electrochemical solution, etc. Even though electrode potential of different
metals is known [1], it gives only qualitative information
of the corrosion. Moreover, the etch rate of bulk metals is
signicantly different from that of thin lms. The metal

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A. Ravi Sankar, S. Das / Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing 16 (2013) 449453

deposition technique and its associated process parameters

coupled with the composition of the etchants produce
signicant etch rate variation in a thin metal lm [4]. Since
different lithographic and etching processes involving various electrolytic chemicals are required for realisation of
the MEMS piezoresistive accelerometers, galvanic corrosion
of the least noble metal cannot be avoided during various
process steps. However, the etch rate of all the metals in the
multilayer stack needs to be precisely measured for designing the fabrication process ow. Thus, in the present work
a systematic study of galvanic corrosion of AlCrAu
metals stack in various metal etchants has been performed
for quantitative estimation of the etch rates of different
metal lms.
2. Experimental procedures
To analyse the galvanic effect, initially the etch rates of
individual Al, Cr and Au metal lms without galvanic
formation were measured. In the present study, aluminium
etchant (type-A), chromium etchant (1020) and gold
etchant (TFA) commercially available from TranseneTM,
USA, were used as electrolytes. The etchants were used
as received and all the etching experiments were carried
out at room temperature without a stirrer. Around 100 ml
volume of etchant was used for each measurement. Al, Cr
and Au/Cr metal lms were deposited by a thermal evaporation process atop a thermally oxidised silicon wafer.
The metal lms were deposited at a base vacuum of
2  10  6 mbar and a substrate temperature of 60 1C. In
the next step, a suitable photo mask was used to create
various patterns with vertical sidewalls using ultraviolet
(UV) photolithography process. Thickness of the initial
metal lms was precisely measured using a Dektak3 surface prolometer. Subsequently, these metal lms were
immersed in the above mentioned etchants for a xed
duration of time at room temperature (25 1C). Etch rates
of the metal lms were calculated by measuring the
thickness difference of the metals before and after etching
and then time averaging the total etch depth measured by
Dektak3 surface prolometer. Results obtained from this
study are given in Table 1.
The galvanic corrosion effect was experimentally analysed using (1) a binary metal stack of Al and Cr and (2) a
ternary metal stack of Al, Cr and Au layers. The schematics
of the binary and ternary metal stacks are shown in
Fig. 1(a) to (d), respectively. In the galvanic corrosion
study, the exposed area eA of the metal lm to be etched
and the contact area cA of that lm with the other metal
lm are important parameters. The exposed area is
dened as the immersed region of the single layer metal
Table 1
Measured etch rates of metals in different etching solutions.
Material

Al
Cr
Au

Etch rate of materials in various etchants (nm/min)

Al etchant

Cr etchant

Au etchant

210

140
130

620
62
240

lm in direct contact with the electrolytic solution whereas the contact area is the overlapping region of the metal
stack layers as schematically shown in Fig. 1(a). Thus in
the present study, samples were prepared with various
exposed areas of the individual lm along with a xed
overlapping region of different metal lms in binary metal
stack as shown in Fig. 1(b). A schematic of the top view
of the AlCrAu ternary metal stack is shown in Fig. 1(c)
with its cross-sectional views across AA0 and BB0 in
Fig. 1(d). In the ternary metal stack layer (AlCrAu)
experiment, cA is the intermetallic contact area of Au
layer at the top of the AlCr stack and eA is the exposed
area of the Al or Cr layer. In this structure, exposed areas
of the Cr and Al lm were kept equal. However, the
exposed areas of Cr layer and Al layer were placed
orthogonally to each other on the silicon surface as shown
in Fig. 1(c). For both binary and ternary metals stacks, ve
different samples with the area ratio cA =eA of 0.25, 0.5, 1,
1.5 and 2 were used for the etch rate study.
For accurate etch rate measurements, lithographically
dened edges are necessary. However, once a metal is
patterned, another metal cannot be deposited and subsequently patterned atop the already patterned metal, since
it may damage underneath metal lm edges due to the
galvanic effect. Hence, in the present study a novel
process step with the combination of lithography process
and selective metal deposition using shadow mask technique [5,6] was used for sample preparation. Silicon
wafers were used for shadow mask preparation by the
anisotropic wet etching technique because of the smooth
edges and wafer surface after anisotropic etching. In the
present study, initially the rst metal lm was deposited
and lithographically patterned. Subsequently the second
metal lm was selectively deposited using the silicon
shadow mask technique to achieve predened exposed
area and contact area. However, in some cases lithography and etching were performed to properly dene the
exposed area of the metal lm keeping the contact or
overlapping area fully protected by a photoresist to avoid
the galvanic corrosion of the underneath metal layer.
The process ow for sample preparation of binary
metal stack is given below with the schematics of each
individual step as shown in Fig. 2(a) to (d). An aluminium
lm of thickness  1 mm was thermally deposited atop a
Si/SiO2 layer (Fig. 2a) and lithography was performed
using a suitable mask (Fig. 2b). Subsequently a 50 nm
thick Cr lm was thermally deposited atop the existing Al
metal lm using a shadow mask as shown in Fig. 2(c).
Then lithography was performed to dene a sharp edge
for Cr lm as shown in Fig. 2(d). During this process the
underlying Al lm was covered by a photoresist. By
varying the dimensions of lithographic mask and shadow
mask, the contact area and exposed area of different metal
lms were varied and Fig. 1(b) shows the binary stack of
AlCr with different exposed areas eA of the lm to
be etched with constant contact area cA . Similarly,
sample for ternary metals stack of AlCrAu was prepared
with a thermally deposited 200 nm thick Au layer atop
the Cr layer. After preparing the samples, both the binary
and ternary metals stacks were dipped in different etching solutions at 25 1C for a xed time and subsequently

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451

Fig. 1. Binary and ternary metal stacks. (a) top view of the AlCr binary stack, (b) a cross-sectional view of the binary metals stack across AA0 with a
varying exposed area of Al layer, (c) top view of the AlCrAu ternary metal stack and (d) cross-sectional views of the ternary metals stacks across AA0
and BB0 .

Fig. 2. Process ow of AlCr binary metal stack for galvanic corrosion

measurements.

the etch rates

prolometer.

were

measured

using

the

surface

3. Results and discussion

Initially, the etch rates of the three materials (Al, Cr
and Au) in the different etching solutions were experimentally measured and the results are shown in Table 1.
It has been found that Al material has poor selectivity in
Cr etchant and Au etchant. Similarly Cr material is also
less selective in Au etchant but it has high selectivity in Al
etchant. Conversely, the Au metal lm is not affected by
both Cr and Al etchants. These results have been used to

quantitatively study the galvanic corrosion of Al, Cr and

Au in the subsequent sections.
The mechanism of galvanic corrosion is a localised
phenomenon by which a metal can be preferentially
etched in an electrolytic solution. The occurrence of
galvanic corrosion depends on the following conditions.
(a) Metals must be far apart in galvanic series. In the
galvanic or electrochemical series the metals are placed
according to their potential measured with respect to a
standard hydrogen electrode (SHE). The anodic or less
noble metals show more negative potential than a more
noble metal in the galvanic series. (b) The two different
metals must be in electrical contact with each other and
(c) metal lms must be bridged by an electrolyte.
Amongst the three metals in galvanic series, Al has the
least electrode potential of 1.66 V whereas Cr and Au
have  0.744 V and 1.83 V [1] respectively with respect
to a standard hydrogen electrode (SHE) and accordingly
Al is the least noble material followed by Cr. Gold is a
noble metal as compared to Al and Cr and has a positive
electrode potential of 1.83 V. Thus, corrosion of Al metal
will occur when a layer of Al makes contact with a more
noble metal such as Cr or Au in an electrolyte.
The etch rate of Al metal in binary metal stack of AlCr
versus cA =eA is shown in Fig. 3. From the graph, it is
evident that Al etch rate increases with increasing area
ratio. For cA =eA 2, Al etch rate increases by 22% in
Al etchant and 40% in Cr etchant as compared to the
Al etch rate without intermetallic effect due to galvanic
corrosion. Cr etchant has greater inuence on etching of
Al as compared to Al etchant. However, with reducing
cA =eA ratio, galvanic etch rate of Al approaches the
chemical etch rate value without the galvanic effect in
both the etchants. A few experiments were carried out
to estimate the galvanic effect on Cr lm in Al and Cr
etching solutions using an AlCr binary metal layer with
different area ratios. The results show that there is less
than 5% variation of Cr etch rate in the Cr etchant with

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A. Ravi Sankar, S. Das / Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing 16 (2013) 449453

Fig. 3. Galvanic etch rate of Al in the binary metal stack of AlCr.

intermetallics effect. Moreover, galvanic corrosion had no

effect on the etch rate of Cr thin lm in Al etchant. These
results imply that the galvanic element formation is
insignicant for the Cr lm when it forms a binary metal
stack with a less noble metal. The relative area of an
anode with respect to a cathode in a metal stack will
affect the amount of corrosion that occurs due to galvanic
corrosion. A small anode i.e., less noble metal like Al
connected to a large cathode i.e. more noble metal like Cr
by an electrolyte will result in a high current density on
the Al layer resulting in a higher rate of corrosion. Thus
the rate of corrosion is inuenced by the area difference.
Conversely, if the area of the anode is larger than that of
the cathode, the corrosion effect is diluted. Even though
difference in electrode potential between Cr and Al in
galvanic series available from literature [1] is relatively
large, galvanic potential has insignicant effect on Al etch
rate in both Al and Cr etchants for (cA =eA ) o1 as observed
in the present study. This implies the signicance of the
contact area to exposed area ratio in the binary metal
stack of Al and Cr.
Fig. 4 shows that the etch rate of Al increases in the
ternary metal stack of AlCrAu with the increase in the
area ratio. It is observed from the results that for cA =eA 2,
etch rate of Al layer is increased by more than two times
in Al etchant and 80% in Cr etchant as compared to the
etch rate of Al layer without intermetallics effect. On the
other hand for cA =eA 0.25, Al etch rate is increased by
62% in Al etchant and 52% in Cr etchant as compared to
the chemical etch rate of Al without the intermetallics
effect. The above results indicate that unlike in binary
metal stack, galvanic effect is more signicant and variation of the area ratio is comparatively less trivial on
Al etch rate in ternary metal stack. This is because Al
and Au are relatively far apart in the electrochemical
series [1] as compared to the Al and Cr metal combination
and thus generate more electrochemical potential in
the electrolytic solution, resulting in increase of galvanic
corrosion. Etch rate of Al in gold etchant could not be

Fig. 4. Galvanic etch rate of Al in the ternary metal stack of AlCrAu.

Fig. 5. Galvanic etch rate of Cr in the ternary metal stack of AlCrAu.

measured accurately to quantify the corrosion rate,

because the etch rate of Al was increased by more than
10 times due to the galvanic effect. It is thus observed
from the above experimental results that in the ternary
stack of AlCrAu, types of the electrolyte and metal lm
are more signicant for galvanic corrosion than the
exposed area of the metal lm to be etched.
Fig. 5 shows the etch rate of Cr in the ternary metal
stack of AlCrAu for different area ratios. The etch rate of
Cr is increased by 56% in the Cr etchant and 29% in the Au
etchant in the ternary metal stack for cA =eA 2 as compared to etch rate of Cr without intermetallic effect. For
cA =eA 0.25, the etch rate of Cr is increased by 40% in the
Cr etchant and 13% in the Au etchant as compared to the
chemical etch rate of Cr without the galvanic effect.
The results imply that the reduction of cA =eA ratio has
comparatively less signicant effect on the galvanic etch
rate of Cr in ternary metal stack. It has also been observed
that Al etchant did not have any effect on the etch rate of

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453

process technique bypasses the wet chemical etching

process of metal layers and thus completely avoids the
galvanic corrosion effect. The accelerometer device fabricated using the innovative process is shown in Fig. 6.
From the gure, both Al interconnection lines and electroplated gold layer atop the proof mass can be seen. The
detailed fabrication process sequence and test results are
published elsewhere [3].
4. Conclusions

Fig. 6. Photograph of a fabricated accelerometer device with an electroplated gold layer and Al metal lines.

Cr and Au. Moreover, in ternary metal stack the etch rate

of Au is not affected by the etchants considered and by
the variation of cA =eA ratio.
The measurement results show that the galvanic effect
inuences the etch rate of Al in the binary and ternary
multilayer metal stack. However, in the binary metal stack
of AlCr, the cA =eA area ratio has a very signicant role in
altering the etch rate of Al. In the ternary metal stack of Al
CrAu the galvanic etch rate of Al is enhanced signicantly
as compared to the etch rate of Al without intermetallics
effect. The phenomenon of galvanic enhanced etch rate of
a thin lm has been effectively used to realise nano-uidic
channels [2]. Comparing with the binary metal stack, it has
been observed that in the ternary stack, the type of
electrolyte and the choice of the metal lm in galvanic
series are more signicant for galvanic corrosion than the
exposed area of the metal lm to be etched.
In various application specic electronics and MEMS
devices, the use of two or more different metal lms is
quite essential for proper functioning of the device. One
such example is a MEMS based silicon piezoresistive
accelerometer where Al metal is used as an interconnect
for signal pick-up and a CrAu layer is used to increase
the proof mass weight [3]. The performance characteristics of the accelerometer device are improved by increasing the proof mass weight [7,8]. Realisation of this device
requires wet chemical etching of all the three metal lms
to achieve the proper geometrical layout. However, the
present study shows that it is quite difcult to achieve the
proper geometrical pattern of the metal lm such as its
mask dimension by the standard process sequence due to
the galvanic effect. Moreover, if the metals in use are
comparatively far apart in the electrochemical series, then
galvanic corrosion is much more dominant, resulting in
more distortion of the metal lines. To overcome this
difculty, the combined method of lithographic process
and shadow mask technique proposed in the present
study is used to fabricate a MEMS piezoresistive accelerometer with an electroplated gold layer. This innovative

Galvanic corrosion of Al thin lm metal in the binary

and ternary metals stacks is presented in this paper.
Experimental results show that the galvanic effect inuences the etch rate of Al in the binary and ternary
multilayer metal stacks. However, in the binary metal
stack of AlCr, the cA =eA area ratio has a very signicant
role in altering the etch rate of Al. In the ternary metal
stack of AlCrAu the galvanic etch rate of Al is enhanced
signicantly as compared to the etch rate of Al without
intermetallics effect. Comparing with the binary metal
stack, it has been observed that in the ternary stack, the
type of electrolyte and the choice of the metal lm in
galvanic series are more signicant for galvanic corrosion
than the exposed area of the metal lm to be etched.
Considering the galvanic effect of Al metal lm in other
electrolytic solutions and resulting pattern distortion, a
piezoresistive accelerometer with patterned gold lm
atop the proof mass has been fabricated with an innovative process step combining shadow masking technique
and electrochemical deposition.

Acknowledgement
The authors would like to express their gratitude to
(Late) Prof. S. Kal for his valuable suggestions. The authors
acknowledge the members of Microelectronics and MEMS
Laboratory, IIT Kharagpur, for their help in the experiment.
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