Dry Etching of Nb and Fabrication of Nb Variable-Thickness-Bridges

Abstract
Several reactive dry etching methods; ion etching, sputter etching and plasma etching, were studied in order to fabricate a niobium variable-thickness type thin film bridge (VTB). Niobium was etched by CF4 reactive sputter etching with submicron accuracy and no significant influence on the superconducting transition temperature except very near the surface (I c R n product obtained was at least 0.42 mV.