Studying thin film thermal conduction is important in the development of many heat related sensors, actuators and microsystems. Emerging non-contact metrologies of membrane thermal conductivity show several advantages when devices are scaling down or novel materials are utilized. In this paper, a method to evaluate membrane thermal conductivity using CdSe/ZnS quantum dots as temperature markers is presented. As an example, the thermal conductivity of 290 nm-thick crystalline silicon thin film is measured as 106 ± 15 W/(m K). Compared to conventional methods, the features of this method, such as fine spatial resolution and non-contact temperature probe, bring the measurement robustness against ambient disturbance and the reduction on measurement system error. Furthermore, this metrology is eligible for thin films of other materials.

Fabrication and properties of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) thin films have been studied for metal-ferroelectric-semiconductor FET (MFSFET) devices. PZT-based MFS capacitors using lead titanate (PT) as seeding layers have been prepared, respectively, on p-type 〈111〉 and n-type 〈100〉 silicon wafers directly by a sol–gel method. PZT/PT films are finally annealed at 650 °C for 1 min in oxygen ambient using rapid thermal annealing (RTA). The measured memory windows of the MFS capacitors are about 1.8 and 5 V under the polarization voltages of ±5 and ±10 V correspondingly. The MFS structure can be valuable for MFSFET applications.

Piezoelectric and ferroelectric films are very promising materials for microelectronic applications. In this paper, some important issues for these materials and applications are reviewed, and recent progresses on integrated ferroelectrics have been given. The physical and chemical preparation methods of the silicon-based piezoelectric and ferroelectric films, such as Sol–Gel, sputtering, metal organic chemical vapor deposition, have been described and compared. To realize a microelectronic device, the integrated circuits compatible ferroelectric/piezoelectric etching method is very important. The wet-chemical etching methods and dry-etching methods, such as reactive ion etching, have been introduced. There are many important applications for the silicon-based piezoelectric and ferroelectric films. One is the micro-sensors or micro-actuators or micro-electro-mechanical-system. Another is the memory devices. Some typical devices using piezoelectric and ferroelectric films have been introduced.