Image sensor
AssigneeTaiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd.
InventorsMing-Hsien YANG, Kun-Hui LIN, Chun-Hao CHOU, Kuo-Cheng LEE
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Abstract
A semiconductor device according to the present disclosure includes a semiconductor layer, a plurality of metal isolation features disposed in the semiconductor layer, wherein certain of the metal isolation features extend through the substrate to provide for full isolation between adjacent photodetectors and certain of the metal isolation features extend partially through the semiconductor layer to provide partially isolation between adjacent photodetectors.
Claims20
A semiconductor device, comprising:
- a semiconductor layer;
- a plurality of isolation trench features disposed in the semiconductor layer, wherein the plurality of isolation trench features includes a first trench extending through an entirety of the semiconductor layer and a second trench extending through a portion of the semiconductor layer and having a terminal end within the semiconductor layer, and a third trench extending through the entirety of the semiconductor layer, wherein the second trench interposes the first trench and the third trench is a cross-sectional view;
- a color filter over the semiconductor layer;
- and
- a microlens disposed over the color filter.
An image sensor, comprising:
- an array of lens including a first lens and a second lens each disposed over a semiconductor substrate;
- a first color filter vertically under the first lens and a second color filter vertically under the second lens;
- a first deep trench isolation (DTI) feature, a second DTI feature, and a third DTI feature, wherein each of the first DTI feature, the second DTI feature, and the third DTI feature extend from a first surface of the semiconductor substrate to an isolation region on a second surface of the semiconductor substrate;
- a first dual photodetector (DPD) vertically under the first lens and the first color filter, and a second DPD vertically under the second lens and the second color filter, wherein the first DPD is disposed between the first DTI feature and the second DTI feature and wherein the second DPD is disposed between the second DTI feature and the third DTI feature;
- and
- wherein the first DPD is configured to allow a photoelectric current to flow from a first photodetector of the first DPD to a second photodetector of the first DPD.
A method of operating an image sensor, comprising:
- providing the image sensor having an array of color filters, wherein a plurality of photodetector channels are associated with each color filter of the array of color filters;
- providing incident light to the array of color filters including incident a first color filter of the array of color filters;
- passing the incident light through the first color filter to a first photodetector channel and a second photodetector channel;
- and
- providing a photoelectric current from the first photodetector channel to the second photodetector channel.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.