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Mariana: A great name for a deep-trench etch tool |
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Apr 03, 2007 at 02:16 PM |
When I think deep trench, I think Mariana, as in the Mariana Trench, the deepest place under the planet's oceans.
Located east of the Mariana Islands chain in the South Pacific, the trench has a maximum depth of 36,201 feet, or about 11,034 meters. When I saw today's announcement about Applied Materials' latest deep-trench etch system, the Centura Mariana, I had to smile at the great branding and wonder why no other etch tool manufacturer had snapped up such an obvious moniker.
Applied says the tool can etch down to a pretty impressive aspect ratio of 80:1, which will come in handy in helping create sub-70-nm DRAM trench capacitor structures. If we applied such a ratio to the Mariana Trench, we'd see a very narrow width of about 453 feet, or 138 meters, to go with the depth of that mighty trench. Actually, the mean width of the Mariana Trench area is about 43 miles, or 69 km, so the aspect ratio, very roughly applied, is more like 1:6.
Here's a branding suggestion for a tool capable of inspecting a Centura Mariana--etched high-aspect-ratio trench: Trieste. That was the name of the plucky submersible that made it to the bottom of the Challenger Deep, the deepest part of the Mariana Trench, in 1960.
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