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Information About

Sheet Resistance




The sheet resistance is a measure of Semiconductor regions (e.g. Silicon or Polysilicon ), and the resistors which are screen printed onto the substrates of Thick Film Hybrid Microcircuits .

The utility of sheet resistance, as opposed to Resistance or Resistivity , is that it is directly measured using a Four-terminal Sensing measurement (also known as a four-point probe measurement).

Sheet resistance is measured in Ohm s/square (\Omega/\square), and is applicable to two-dimensional systems where the thin film is considered to be a two dimensional entity. It is equivalent to Resistivity as used in three-dimensional systems. When the term sheet resistance is used, the current must be flowing along the plane of the sheet, not perpendicular to it.

In a regular three-dimensional conductor, the Resistance can be written as
:R= ho rac{L}{A} = ho rac{L}{W t}
where ho is the resistivity, A is the cross-sectional area and L is the length. The cross-sectional area can be split into the width W and the sheet thickness t.

By grouping the resistivity with the thickness, the resistance can then be written as

:R = rac{ ho}{t} rac{L}{W} = R_s rac{L}{W}

R_s is then the sheet resistance. Because it is multiplied by a dimensionless quantity, the units are ohms. The term ohms/square is used because it gives the resistance in ohms of current passing from one side of a square region to the opposite side, regardless of the size of the square. For a square, L = W. Therefore, R = R_s for any size square.


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