Hot-wall furnace for semiconductor processing

Hot-wall furnace reactors are used in semiconductor fabrication to grow layers of semiconductor materials on wafers. An important aspect is to grow the layers with a crystal structure that matches that of the wafer substrate. This is called epitaxial growth and is a key technology for the fabrication of electronic devices. For silicon carbide (a wide-bandgap semiconductor), epitaxial growth is one of the great challenges towards manufacturing reliable devices.

The layer growth takes place with the wafers sitting in graphite susceptors (wafer holders) at very high temperatures. The susceptors are heated with radio-frequency (RF) coils at power levels in the 10 kW range. The design of the reactor chamber is crucial for maintaining a uniform temperature, efficient heating, and control of high-temperature regions. It is especially important that the quartz tube surrounding the susceptor remains at moderate temperatures.

This model examines a simple furnace design that heats a graphite susceptor using an 8-kW RF signal at 20 kHz. It determines the temperature distribution over the wafer along with the temperature on the outer quartz tube. At these temperatures, the heat flux is dominated by radiation, which is also simulated in this multiphysics model.

Inductance of a power inductor

Power inductors are a central part of many low-frequency power applications such as switched power supplies and DC-DC converters. The relatively low voltage and high power consumption they operate under put high demands on the design of such inductors.

A power inductor usually has a magnetic core to increase its inductance value, reducing the demands for a high frequency while keeping the component size small. The magnetic core also reduces electromagnetic interference with other devices. Computer simulations or measurements are necessary in the design of such as often only crude analytical or empirical formulas are available for calculating their impedances.

The model shows an inductance calculation on a large 3D geometry using higher-order vector elements and memory-efficient iterative solver settings.

Simulation of a generator

This example shows how the circular motion of a rotor with permanent magnets can be simulated while taking the rotation into account. The generated voltage is calculated as a function of time during the rotation. The model also shows the influence of material parameters, rotation velocity, and the number of turns in the winding on the calculated voltage.

In particular, the Rotating Machinery Multiphysics Coupling is introduced in this example. This allows sliding mesh to be simulated and gives a true calculation of the electromagnetic field as a function of time.