AVS 49th International Symposium
    Plasma Science Wednesday Sessions
       Session PS-WeM

Paper PS-WeM4
Metal Etching in High-Density Plasmas

Wednesday, November 6, 2002, 9:20 am, Room C-105

Session: Conductor Etch II
Presenter: R. Blumenthal, Auburn University
Authors: R. Blumenthal, Auburn University
A.S. Orland, Auburn University
Correspondent: Click to Email
Metals are found at the heart of many important current and developing device technologies, such as GMR read heads, MRAM and FeRAM. As the scale of these devices continues to be reduced, high performance etch technologies will become a necessary component of the fabrication of these devices. The chemical mechanisms of high-density plasma etching of Fe, Ni, Co and their alloys will be presented for a range of etch chemistries ranging from the more traditional etching of the metals with Cl@sub 2@ to the more novel example of CO-NH@sub 3@ etching and finally to a new etch chemistry based on H@sub 2@-CO gas mixtures. The chemical mechanisms of etching have been determined from measurements of the variation of chemical composition as a function of plasma conditions, using supersonic pulse, plasma sampling mass spectrometry.