Large-area fabrication of high aspect ratio tantalum photonic crystals for high-temperature selective emitters

The authors present highly selective emitters based on two-dimensional tantalum (Ta) photonic crystals, fabricated on 2 in. polycrystalline Ta substrates, for high-temperature applications, e.g., thermophotovoltaic energy conversion. In this study, a fabrication route facilitating large-area photonic crystal fabrication with high fabrication uniformity and accuracy, based on interference lithography and reactive ion etching is discussed. A deep reactive ion etch process for Ta was developed using an SF6/C4F8 based Bosch process, which enabled us to achieve ∼8.5 μm deep cavities with an aspect ratio of ∼8, with very steep and smooth sidewalls. The thermal emitters fabricated by this method show excellent spectral selectivity, enhancement of the emissivity below cut-off approaching unity, and a sharp cut-off between the high emissivity region and the low emissivity region, while maintaining the low intrinsic emissivity of bare Ta above the cut-off wavelength. The experimental results show excellent agreement with numerical simulations.