Abstract
A noble analytical technique basing on focused ion beam (FIB) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) to evaluate quantitatively the sidewall roughness of oblique faces of free-standing objects in micro electro mechanical systems (MEMS) devices was developed. The FIB sampling technique conventionally used for the preparation of transmission electron microscopy specimens was applied for fabricating AFM specimens of free-standing objects. The proposed FIB-AFM technique was employed to measure the surface roughness of sidewalls of free-standing Si bridges specially fabricated for this study. The results revealed that the developed FIB-AFM technique is effective to evaluate quantitatively surface roughness parameters of the order of sub-nm for free-standing objects with sub-μm size in MEMS devices.
