Investigating Effect of Conditioner Aggressiveness on Removal Rate during Interlayer Dielectric Chemical Mechanical Planarization through Confocal Microscopy and Dual Emission Ultraviolet-Enhanced Fluorescence Imaging

Sun, Tian; Borucki, L.; Zhuang, Yun; Sampurno, Yasa; Sudargho, Fransisca; Wei, Xiaomin; Anjur, Sriram; Philipossian, Ara

doi:10.1143/jjap.49.026501

Cited by 32 publications

(71 citation statements)

References 15 publications

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“…Such a study is important because previously published works have shown that the pad surface micro-texture has important effects in CMP such as material removal rate, within-wafer-nonuniformity and wafer-level defects. (4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9)(10)…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of Conditioning Downforce and Pad Break-In Time on Pad Surface Micro-Texture

McAllister

Stuffle

Sampurno

et al. 2018

ECS J. Solid State Sci. Technol.

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The effect of conditioning downforce during pad break-in, and its impact on the evolution of pad surface micro-texture was investigated. Two different conditioning downforces were used to break-in pads. Pad samples were extracted after certain break-in times and analyzed for their topography and contact area using confocal microscopy. Results showed that the pad-wafer contact area and contact density decreased with conditioning downforce. Break-in at the higher conditioning downforce helped in reaching faster stabilized values of the analyzed micro-texture parameters. The evolution of these parameters was different for the two different downforces, however as break-in time increased past 30 minutes, mean summit height and mean summit curvature began to approach approximately the same value. These results indicated that, for the particular disc used in this study, a change in the magnitude of downforce during pad break-in caused a change in break-in time and stable values for some micro-texture parameters. However, a

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of Conditioning Downforce and Pad Break-In Time on Pad Surface Micro-Texture

McAllister

Stuffle

Sampurno

et al. 2018

ECS J. Solid State Sci. Technol.

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“…11 Elmufdi et al and Muldowney et al showed that pad surface with higher contact area could reduce CMP-related defects since higher contact area induces lower local pressure to the wafer. 12,13 As Ting et al 10 found that a more aggressive disk creates pad surface with less contact area, the more aggressive diamond disk is expected to generate more defects during CMP processes. In this study, aggressive diamonds are identified for two perpendicular disk orientations.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aggressive Diamond Characterization and Wear Analysis during Chemical Mechanical Planarization

Zhuang

Liao

et al. 2012

ECS J. Solid State Sci. Technol.

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A 3M A3700 diamond disk was used to condition a Cabot Microelectronics Corporation D100 pad for 30 hours, and wear on its aggressive diamonds was analyzed. The top 20 aggressive diamonds for two perpendicular disk orientations were identified before wafer polishing, as well as after 15-hour and 30-hour polishing. Results showed that the original top 20 aggressive diamonds identified before polishing were subjected to wear after the first 15-hour polishing as the furrow surface area that they generated decreased dramatically by 47%. As these original aggressive diamonds were worn, seven new aggressive diamonds were "born" and joined the new top 20 list for both disk orientations. After the second 15-hour wafer polishing, the furrow surface area of these new top 20 aggressive diamonds did not change significantly. The furrow surface area created by all the active diamonds exhibited the same trend as the top 20 aggressive diamonds, confirming that most pad conditioning work was performed by these aggressive diamonds and that the disk lost its aggressiveness in the first 15 hours of polishing and then maintained its aggressiveness during the second 15 hours.Chemical and mechanical planarization (CMP) has been widely employed in the integrated circuit manufacturing industry to achieve local and global surface planarity. It is well known that diamond disks are commonly used for pad conditioning to prevent removal rate decay during CMP as the embedded diamonds cut across the pad surface under an applied load to regenerate pad asperities and remove used slurry and pad debris. 1-3 During pad conditioning, pad asperities and slurry abrasives make mechanical contact with the diamonds causing the diamonds to wear, 3 leading to the loss of disk effectiveness. A conventional diamond disk is typically replaced after dozens of hours of use. 4 Therefore, it is important to investigate diamond wear and loss of disk efficiency. There have been a few studies on diamond wear during CMP. For example, Liao 5 found that peripheral diamonds and the diamonds that originally protrude more highly with crest lines oriented upward wear faster. Borucki et al. 6,7 demonstrated that for a conventional diamond disk, typically less than 1 percent of the embedded diamonds (called active diamonds) create cutting furrows on the pad surface during pad conditioning. Other diamonds (referred as inactive diamonds) are not involved in pad cutting. Among the active diamonds, typically only 10 to 20 diamonds (named as aggressive diamonds) do the majority of the cutting and are therefore most susceptible to fracture or being pulled out. In a recent study, Meled et al. 3 conducted 24-hour wear tests using three types of diamond disks. Results showed the presence of micro-wear on the aggressive diamonds and no appreciable wear on the inactive diamonds. While diamond wear has been characterized to some extent, several questions remain unanswered. For example, do new aggressive diamonds appear as the original aggressive diamonds wear? How do these new aggressi...

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“…3,4) Sun et al employed laser confocal microscopy to measure the pad surface contact area as well as pad surface topography and studied the relation between contact area and contact summit density under different pressures. 5,6) In a recent study, 10) 200-mm blanket copper wafers were polished and the polishing results were correlated to the pad surface contact area and topography. It was found that higher near contact area induced by the fractured and collapsed pore walls plays a significant role in lowering the coefficient of friction (COF) and removal rate during Cu CMP.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…Most of these studies found that higher contact area leads to lower removal rate due to the lower local contact pressure. 6,[20][21][22] In this study, pad surface contact area percentages are calculated and their values are 0.040 and 0.011% at the conditioning forces of 26.7 and 44.5 N, respectively. Recall that average removal rates are 2,015 and 3,288 A/min at the conditioning forces of 26.7 and 44.5 N, respectively.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of Pad Surface Micro-Texture on Removal Rate during Interlayer Dielectric Chemical Mechanical Planarization Process

Liao

Zhuang

Borucki³

et al. 2012

Jpn. J. Appl. Phys.

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The effect of pad surface micro-texture on removal rate in interlayer dielectric chemical mechanical planarization was investigated. Blanket 200mm oxide wafers were polished on a Dow â IC1000ä K-groove pad conditioned at two different conditioning forces. The coefficient of friction increased slightly (by 7%) while removal rate increased dramatically (by 65%) when conditioning force was increased from 26.7 to 44.5 N. Pad surface micro-texture analysis results showed that pad surface contact area decreased dramatically (by 71%) at the conditioning force of 44.5 N, leading to a sharp increase in the local contact pressure and resulting in a significantly higher removal rate.

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Investigating Effect of Conditioner Aggressiveness on Removal Rate during Interlayer Dielectric Chemical Mechanical Planarization through Confocal Microscopy and Dual Emission Ultraviolet-Enhanced Fluorescence Imaging

Cited by 32 publications

References 15 publications

Effect of Conditioning Downforce and Pad Break-In Time on Pad Surface Micro-Texture

Effect of Conditioning Downforce and Pad Break-In Time on Pad Surface Micro-Texture

Aggressive Diamond Characterization and Wear Analysis during Chemical Mechanical Planarization

Effect of Pad Surface Micro-Texture on Removal Rate during Interlayer Dielectric Chemical Mechanical Planarization Process

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