Arpelier and professional TCAD serve different questions
Arpelier is positioned as a pre-TCAD visualization environment for exploring process–structure relationships before detailed physical simulation. “Pre-TCAD” here describes a working stage, not a standardized standalone product category: the goal is to clarify structure and process logic before quantitative analysis.
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Role comparison
| Question | Arpelier | Professional TCAD |
|---|---|---|
| Primary question | How does a supported process sequence create and change structure? | How do calibrated physical mechanisms and device behavior respond? |
| Main inputs | Ordered process steps, geometric conditions, materials, and masks | Geometry, meshes, material parameters, physical models, boundary conditions, and calibrated process inputs |
| Main outputs | Step-by-step 3D structures, cross-sections, and communication views | Quantitative fields, process or device results, curves, and extracted metrics |
| Best-fit stage | Learning, early structural exploration, review, and communication | Detailed analysis, prediction, calibration, and engineering validation |
| Quantitative prediction | Not the primary purpose | A central purpose when suitable models and calibration are used |
| Relationship | Clarifies structural intent before detailed analysis | Tests the questions that require professional physical simulation |
Questions Arpelier is designed to answer
Arpelier helps answer questions such as: What structure follows from this supported sequence? How does an earlier geometric condition change later stages? Where is a feature visible in 3D or cross-section? Which process stages should a student, colleague, or audience inspect?
Questions that require professional analysis
Quantitative electrical behavior, detailed transport, stress, thermal response, calibrated process physics, equipment-specific behavior, and other predictive questions require appropriate professional TCAD models, material data, calibration, and expert validation. The exact tool depends on the question.
Explicit limits
- Quantitative prediction of electrical device characteristics is not Arpelier’s primary purpose.
- Arpelier does not guarantee actual fabrication results, yield, or equipment-recipe outcomes.
- Its supported operations do not cover every material and process physics mechanism.
- Its visual structure does not replace professional TCAD, experiments, metrology, or process validation.
A complementary workflow
- Use Arpelier to express an early process sequence and structural intent.
- Inspect intermediate stages and identify the assumptions that matter.
- Select the questions that require quantitative simulation or experimental evidence.
- Move those questions into suitable TCAD, laboratory, and validation workflows.
The handoff is conceptual rather than an automatic solver integration.