Evanescent microwave probes on high-resistivity silicon and its application in characterization of semiconductors

In this article we report the design, fabrication, and characterization of very high quality factor 10 GHz microstrip resonators on high-resistivity ( high-rho) silicon substrates. Our experiments show that an external quality factor of over 13 000 can be achieved on microstripline resonators on high -rho silicon substrates. Such a high Q factor enables integration of arrays of previously reported evanescent microwave probe (EMP) on silicon cantile ver beams. We also demonstrate that electron-hole pair recombination and ge neration lifetimes of silicon can be conveniently measured by illuminating the resonator using a pulsed light. Alternatively, the EMP was also used to nondestructively monitor excess carrier generation and recombination proce ss in a semiconductor placed near the two-dimensional resonator. (C) 1999 A merican Institute of Physics. [S0034-6748(99)00807-2].