In-situ Contamination Thickness Measurement by Novel Resist Evaluation System at NewSUBARU

Matsuda, Naohiro; Watanabe, Takeo; Harada, Tetsuo; Kinoshita, Hiroo; Oizumi, Hiroaki; Itani, Toshiro

doi:10.1143/jjap.50.06gb02

Cited by 4 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 20 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Thus, contaminating carbon layer evaluation should be carried out at an EUV irradiation power higher than 100 mW/cm 2 . 16,22) The contaminating carbon layer measurement was performed using a high power of in-band EUV light; however, no real resist was employed for this contaminating carbon layer thickness measurement. 23) Using high-power EUV light in the wavelength regions from 6 to 12 nm, the contaminating carbon layer thickness measurement was performed using a real resist material.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Tool for Contamination Layer Thickness Measurement Using High Power Extreme Ultraviolet Light and in Situ Ellipsometer

Watanabe

Kikuchi

Takahashi

et al. 2013

Jpn. J. Appl. Phys.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithographic exposure is performed in a vacuum environment. The Mo/Si multilayers used as imaging optics and a mask can be contaminated by carbon, which is originally an outgassing species of the hydrocarbons that decompose from the resist materials during EUV exposure. This carbon contamination reduces the total reflectivity of the imaging optics and mask, and affects the lithographic performance, including the throughput and resist pattern replication resolution. This contamination should be reduced to maintain the lithographic performance; thus, the relationship between the carbon contamination and the outgassing species should be clarified. We therefore developed a novel tool for in situ contamination layer thickness evaluation. The distinctive features of this tool are as follows: 1) exposure using a total power of in-band EUV light (267 mW/cm2) that is as high as that required for high-volume manufacturing (>100 mW/cm2), 2) the visible light beam of the in situ spectroscopic ellipsometry is focused on the Mo/Si multilayer witness sample to obtain the detection limit for measured thickness and that the limit was found to be 0.03 nm, and 3) the witness and 8-in. resist wafer sample stages have extremely low outgassing characteristics. Using this tool, a starting adhesion point was observed and the carbon contamination layer thickness was evaluated during the resist exposure. For 90 min resist exposure, no contamination adhered onto the Mo/Si witness sample until the exposure time reached 25 min, and after which, the contamination started to adhere to the witness sample.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Tool for Contamination Layer Thickness Measurement Using High Power Extreme Ultraviolet Light and in Situ Ellipsometer

Watanabe

Kikuchi

Takahashi

et al. 2013

Jpn. J. Appl. Phys.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The first approach used a witness-plate method 5,6 to establish correlations between the outgassed species and the contaminated optics to develop an understanding of how to mitigate optics contamination in EUVL high-volume manufacturing processess. [7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] Ellipsometry was used to correlate the contamination thickness with the exposure dose and gaseous contaminants, and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy was used to analyze the chemical compositions of the cleanable and noncleanable contaminants. ASML defined the test flows of resist outgassing and set resist specifications for compliance based on the transmission loss of the witness sample as a consequence of noncleanable contamination.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Outgassing and photochemical studies of photosensitive films upon irradiation at 13.5 nm

Shao

Sung

et al. 2012

Journal of Vacuum Science &Amp; Technology B, Nanotechnology and Microelectronics: Materials, Processing, Measurement, and Phen

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Neutral outgassed species from polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA), a model resist (denoted RRR), and three underlayer thin films have been characterized and their absolute outgassing rates determined using a quadrupole mass spectrometer following irradiation at 13.5 nm. The radiation, which was in the extreme ultraviolet (EUV) energy range at 13.5 nm, was delivered from the 08A1-beamline at the National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center in Taiwan. The side chains of acryl-type polymers that are vulnerable to fragmentation and outgassing upon EUV irradiation were characterized and the important outgassed species (H 2 O and H 3 O þ ) were identified from the Si-containing photosensitive materials. The authors propose that the Si-OH formed on the Si-containing surfaces upon EUV irradiation likely undergoes subsequent incremental H 2 O and H 3 O þ outgassing upon cumulative EUV irradiation. A benchmark comparison revealed that the absolute outgassing rates of PMMA, RRR, and a Si-containing underlayer sample determined in this work were consistent with values previously reported in the literature. Thus, we have effectively demonstrated that the Taiwanese facility is capable of evaluating absolute resist outgassing rates, making it one of a limited number of EUV resist evaluation sites worldwide. The authors have provided direct evidence that the extent of ionic and neutral outgassing from 80, 100, and 125 nm PMMA and RRR films is not thickness-dependent. The authors have further demonstrated that the absolute outgassing rates of PMMA and RRR films of various thickness and two oxy-hydrocarbon underlayer samples correlated strongly with the 13.5 nm photoabsorption (r abs ) and the structural toughness [double-bond-equivalence-per-backbone (DBEPB)] of the polymers. The authors revealed that the formula r abs /DBEPB could be used as a generic metric to predict the resistance of photosensitive films to EUV irradiation for the oxy-hydrocarbons in this work and four previously studied photoresists.

show abstract

“…From 2002 to 2010, the EUVL-research consortium program by Semiconductor Leading Edge Technologies, Inc. (SELETE) which was a Japanese consortium was started. In this program, for the resist development and resist outgassing evaluation, Kinoshita's group collaborated with SELETE [37,38].…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Photopolymer Science and Technology Award

Kinoshita

2014

J. Photopol. Sci. Technol.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

In-situ Contamination Thickness Measurement by Novel Resist Evaluation System at NewSUBARU

Cited by 4 publications

References 20 publications

Development of Tool for Contamination Layer Thickness Measurement Using High Power Extreme Ultraviolet Light and in Situ Ellipsometer

Development of Tool for Contamination Layer Thickness Measurement Using High Power Extreme Ultraviolet Light and in Situ Ellipsometer

Outgassing and photochemical studies of photosensitive films upon irradiation at 13.5 nm

The Photopolymer Science and Technology Award

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About