A semiconductor substrate is configured for dicing into separate die or individual semiconductor devices. The semiconductor substrate can comprise silicon, silicon carbide, or gallium nitride. A dicing grid bounds each semiconductor device on the semiconductor substrate. A die singulation process is configured to occur in the dicing grid. Material is coupled to the dicing grid. In one embodiment, the material can comprise carbon. A laser is configured to couple energy to the material coupled to the dicing grid. The energy from the laser heats the material. The heat from the material or the temperature differential between the material and the dicing creates a thermal shock that generates a vertical fracture in the semiconductor substrate that separates the semiconductor device from the remaining semiconductor substrate.

Implementations of a method for healing a crack in a semiconductor substrate may include identifying a crack in a semiconductor substrate and heating an area of the semiconductor substrate including the crack until the crack is healed.

Over a front surface of a silicon semiconductor wafer is deposited a high dielectric constant film with a silicon oxide film, serving as an interface layer, provided between the semiconductor wafer and the high dielectric constant film. After a chamber houses the semiconductor wafer, a chamber's pressure is reduced to be lower than atmospheric pressure. Subsequently, a gaseous mixture of ammonia and nitrogen gas is supplied into the chamber to return the pressure to ordinary pressure, and the front surface is irradiated with a flash light, thereby performing post deposition annealing (PDA) on the high dielectric constant film. Since the pressure is reduced once to be lower than atmospheric pressure and then returned to ordinary pressure, a chamber's oxygen concentration is lowered remarkably during the PDA. This restricts an increase in thickness of the silicon oxide film underlying the high dielectric constant film by oxygen taken in during the PDA.

A plasma processing apparatus includes: a processing container which defines a processing space; a microwave generator; a dielectric having an opposing surface which faces the processing space; a slot plate formed with a plurality of slots; and a heating member provided within the slot plate. The slot plate is provided on a surface of the dielectric at an opposite side to the opposing surface to radiate microwaves for plasma excitation to the processing space through the dielectric based on the microwaves generated by the microwave generator.

It is an object to provide a highly reliable semiconductor device with good electrical characteristics and a display device including the semiconductor device as a switching element. In a transistor including an oxide semiconductor layer, a needle crystal group provided on at least one surface side of the oxide semiconductor layer grows in a c-axis direction perpendicular to the surface and includes an a-b plane parallel to the surface, and a portion except for the needle crystal group is an amorphous region or a region in which amorphousness and microcrystals are mixed. Accordingly, a highly reliable semiconductor device with good electrical characteristics can be formed.

A method for producing a group III nitride semiconductor includes a loading step (S1), a decompression step (S2), a heating step (S3), an excitation gas supply step (S5), and an organometallic gas supply step (S6). In the loading step (Si), a substrate is loaded into a chamber. In the decompression step (S2), a suction part reduces a pressure inside the chamber. In the heating step (S3), a heater provided inside the chamber heats the substrate. In the excitation gas supply step (S5), a first gas that contains nitrogen without containing hydrogen is supplied to a plasma generator, and an excitation gas obtained by turning the first gas into plasma by the plasma generator is supplied to the substrate inside the chamber. In the organometallic gas supply step (S6), a second gas that is an organometallic gas that contains a group III element is supplied to the substrate inside the chamber.

A semiconductor device includes first to fourth semiconductor regions, and first and second electrodes. The second semiconductor region is selectively disposed in a surface layer of one main surface of the first semiconductor region. The first electrode is in contact with a contact region of the second semiconductor region. The third semiconductor region is disposed in a surface layer on another main surface of the first semiconductor region, and having an impurity concentration higher than that of the first semiconductor region. The second electrode is in contact with the third semiconductor region. The fourth semiconductor region of the second conductivity type is disposed in the first semiconductor region, and disposed closer to the one main surface than the third semiconductor region. The fourth semiconductor region is disposed at least within the contact region in a plan view.

A resistive element in an artificial neural network, the resistive element includes a Silicon-on-insulator (SOI) substrate, and a Silicon layer formed on the Silicon-on-insulator substrate. The Silicon layer includes dopants derived from a thin film dopant layer, and the thin film dopant layer includes a programmed amount of dopant including at least one of Boron and Phosphorus.

A method of forming a resistive random access memory (RRAM) element, the method includes forming a Silicon layer on an oxide layer, depositing a thin film dopant layer on the Silicon layer, and controlling a concentration of the dopant in the thin film dopant layer.

A stack of layers providing an ohmic contact with the semiconductor, a lower metal layer of the stack is disposed in direct contact with the semiconductor; and a radiation absorption control layer disposed over the lower layer for controlling an amount of the radiant energy to be absorbed in the radiation absorption control layer during exposure of the stack to the radiation during a process used to alloy the stack with the semiconductor to form the ohmic contact.