| AVS 66th International Symposium & Exhibition | |
| Complex Oxides: Fundamental Properties and Applications Focus Topic | Tuesday Sessions |
| Session OX+EM+HC+MI+NS+SS+TF-TuA |
| Session: | Complex Oxides: Catalysis, Dielectric Properties and Memory Applications |
| Presenter: | Sebastian Engelmann, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center |
| Authors: | S.U. Engelmann, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center T. Ando, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center V. Narayanan, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
As the semiconductor industry continues to push for and develop higher performance computing systems, there is also a growing trend of redeveloping or optimizing fundamental computing approaches to be more energy efficient. The development of hardware for novel AI systems is no exception. New integration schemes, novel materials, multi-component materials or even nanoscale materials and the ability to integrate all of these approaches together becomes the compounded challenge. Deposition and etch technologies that offer differentiating solutions to these issues therefore need to meet somewhat conflicting demands, such as low damage processing as well as high rate processing beside many other issues.
Novel thin films, thin film laminates and alloys promising unprecedented performance are very interesting candidates to enable such computing paradigm shifts. In particular the class of complex oxides is a very interesting area of research as they offer new phenomena such as ferroelectricity, ferromagnetism or high temperature conductivity. While new phenomena are being discovered, unraveling the fundamental physics behind these properties is a critical element for an industrial exploitation of these properties.
In addition, these new and complex materials are growing the need for the ultimate process solution: atomic layer precision processing. Atomic layer etching is a promising path to answer the processing demands of new devices at the Angstrom scale. Self-limiting reactions, discrete reaction and activation steps or extremely low ion energy plasmas are some of the pathways being pursued for precise material removal control and maintaining the original film performance. Depending on the nature of the material, the etch response may be either too much or not enough chemical modifications of the material. Resulting modifications of the films is an important variable to consider in the readiness of material systems. In particular synergy to deposition approaches such as atomic layer deposition has been proposed as a solution, but more work is needed.