Thermal oxidation

In microfabrication, thermal oxidation is a way to produce a thin layer of oxide (usually silicon dioxide) on the surface of a wafer. The technique forces an oxidizing agent to diffuse into the wafer at high temperature and react with it. The rate of oxide growth is often predicted by the Deal-Grove model. Thermal oxidation may be applied to different materials, but this article will only consider oxidation of silicon substrates to produce silicon dioxide.