Fabrication of Robust, Flat, Thinned, UVImaging CCDs

An improved process that includes a high-temperature bonding subprocess has been developed to enable the fabrication of robust, flat, silicon-based charge-coupled devices (CCDs) for imaging in ultraviolet (UV) light and/or for detecting low energy charged particles. The CCDs in question are devices on which CCD circuitry has already been formed and have been thinned for back-surface illumination. These CCDs may be delta doped, and aspects of this type of CCD have been described in several prior articles in NASA Tech Briefs. Unlike prior low-temperature bonding subprocesses based on the use of epoxies or waxes, the high-temperature bonding subprocess is compatible with the delta-doping process as well as with other CCD-fabrication processes.