> I have one 100um-wide eletrode (formed by 100 A Ti/ 1500 A
> Au)  on Si wafer, but a dcing line is crossing this
> electrode. If I dice the wafer with a 25um-thcik
> blade, is it possible to damage the electrode,
> say, metal peeling off ??

There are probably two separate risks here. One is that during the dicing
process, you can smear some of the metal down the sidewall of the cut,
creating a Schottky contact to the silicon. You can mitigate this risk a bit
by swabbing some gold etch along the edges of the die. That is, if you have
some gold etch handy. I'd recommend you use a low power microscope if one is
available.

The second risk is that the metal lines on the surface of the wafer will be
damaged by the sawing process. Because a wafer sawing process is wet, it's
possible that some of the wafer particles in the slurry will cause some
damage on the surface of the wafer. I would think that if you have good gold
adhesion, your lines would get a little chewed up, but still survive.

Bill Eaton, Ph.D.
Materials & Analysis Manager
NP Photonics
bill@npphotonics.com