| AVS 61st International Symposium & Exhibition | |
| Plasma Science and Technology | Wednesday Sessions |
| Session PS-WeA |
| Session: | Plasma Diagnostics, Sensors, and Control |
| Presenter: | Alex Paterson, Lam Research Corp |
| Authors: | A. Paterson, Lam Research Corp J. Holland, Lam Research Corp S. Sriraman, Lam Research Corp E. Hudson, Lam Research Corp H. Singh, Lam Research Corp V. Vahedi, Lam Research Corp |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
Over the last decade, semiconductor industry growth has been driven chiefly by the demand for consumer electronics: the move to mobile smart devices such as phones and tablet PC’s. It is now common place for hand-held mobile devices to have 32 Gb of memory and processor speeds of over 1 GHz, a truly remarkable feat that would have been unthinkable 10 years ago. This capability has been enabled by the continuation of IC scaling to smaller and smaller features sizes with the present technology being mass produced by 28 nm node technology and smaller nodes down to 10 nm currently being developed by IC manufacturers. The limitations of lithography to keep up with the decrease in dimensions required for these smaller nodes has resulted in new challenges for plasma etch to enable patterning at these small feature sizes. Device performance requirements also drive critical dimension (CD) non-uniformity to less than one nanometer across the entire 300 mm wafer for sub-20 nm features and yield requirements extend this pattering region to within 1.5 mm of the wafer edge. Wafer fabrication production also relies on plasma etch solutions to be stable at these levels across long periods of time and capable of flexibility in multiple applications. The realization of all of these goals has been greatly facilitated by a much better understanding of the basic chemical, physical, and electromagnetic processes that occur during the plasma etch of semiconductor devices.
In this paper we will discuss the crucial role diagnostics play in achieving this understanding and in the development of state of the art plasma etch chamber technology that allow the continuation of Moore’s Law. Diagnostics are essential not only to understand etch mechanisms and chamber characteristics but to also accelerate hardware development in order to meet customer time critical needs. We will review the different types of diagnostics commonly used in plasma etch chamber development with reference to findings from literature and augment this with diagnostic work undertaken at Lam Research. Finally, we will discuss the suitability of diagnostics in main stream production and give some thoughts on future diagnostics that may be required for production enhancement and also angstrom level etching.