AVS 61st International Symposium & Exhibition
    Plasma Science and Technology Wednesday Sessions
       Session PS2-WeM

Paper PS2-WeM10
Two Dimensional Simulations of the Impact of Weak Magnetic Fields on the Plasma Properties of a Planar Slot Antenna Surface Wave Driven Plasma Source

Wednesday, November 12, 2014, 11:00 am, Room 308

Session: Plasma Modeling
Presenter: Jun Yoshikawa, Tokyo Electron Ltd.
Authors: J. Yoshikawa, Tokyo Electron Ltd.
Y. Susa, Tokyo Electron Miyagi Limited
P. Ventzek, Tokyo Electron America, Inc.
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The radial line slot antenna plasma source is a type of surface wave plasma source driven by a planar slotted antenna. Microwave power is transmitted through a slot antenna structure and dielectric window to a plasma characterized by a generation zone adjacent to the window and a diffusion zone that contacts a substrate. The diffusion zone is characterized by a very low electron temperature. This renders the source useful for soft etch applications and thin film deposition processes requiring low ion energy. Another property of the diffusion zone is that the plasma density tends to decrease from the axis to the walls under the action of ambipolar diffusion. A previous simulation study [1] predicted that the anisotropy in transport parameters due to weak static magnetic fields less than 50 Gauss could be leveraged to manipulate the plasma profile in the radical direction. These simulations motivated experimental tests in which weak magnetic fields were applied to a radial line slot antenna source. Plasma absorption probe measurements of electron density and etch rate measurements showed that the magnetic fields remote from the wafer were able to manipulate both electron density and etch rate. The presentation includes a brief recap of the first simulations, a summary of the experimental results and new simulation results that mate to these experiments. [1] J. Vac. Sci. Technol. A 31, 031306 (2013)