ADVANCING THE ION BEAM THIN FILM PLANARIZATION PROCESS FOR THE SMOOTHING OF SUBSTRATE PARTICLES
For a number of technologies small substrate contaminants are undesirable, and for one technology in particular, extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL), they can be a very serious issue. We have demonstrated that the Ion Beam Thin Film Planarization Process, a coating process designed to planarize substrate asperities, can be extended to smooth {approx}70 nm and {approx}80 nm diameter particles on EUVL reticle substrates to a height of {approx}0.5 nm, which will render them noncritical in an EUVL printing process. We demonstrate this smoothing process using controlled nanoscale substrate particles and lines fabricated with an e-beam lithography process. The above smoothing process was also modified to yield an excellent reflectance/wavelength uniformity and a good EUV reflectivity for the multilayer, which is required for EUVL reticles. Cross-sectional TEM on a smoothed substrate line defect shows excellent agreement with results obtained from our multilayer growth model.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-48
- OSTI ID:
- 875672
- Report Number(s):
- UCRL-JRNL-207515; TRN: US200603%%193
- Journal Information:
- Microelectronic Engineering, Vol. 77, Issue 4
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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