Three-color lithography (3CL) produces features on the scale of tens of nanometers using visible light. In this technique,
one beam pre-activates a photoresist, a second beam deactivates it, and a third beam activates the pre-activated regions
that have not been deactivated. The deactivation beam trims features, allowing for improved feature size and resolution.
Creating permeable thin films enables us to further control feature size using oxygen as a quencher. We will discuss these
thin-film studies, which are a promising step towards large-area patterning.
Multicolor photolithography using visible light holds the promise of achieving wafer-scale patterning at pitches on the 10 nm scale. Although substantial progress has been made on multicolor techniques, a number of challenges remain to be met before the ultimate resolution of these methods can be reached. These challenges include the development of improved materials, creation of high-quality thin films, transitioning to exposure schemes that rely completely on linear absorption, scaling up to large-area patterning, and developing methods for effective pattern transfer. This paper discusses the state of the art in multicolor photolithography, presents some of the most recent advances in this field, and examines the prospects moving forward.
Three-color lithography (3CL) can produce high-resolution features using visible light. This technique uses one beam to pre-activate a photoresist, a second beam to deactivate it, and a third beam to activate the pre-activated regions that have not been deactivated. The deactivation beam is used to trim features, allowing for improved feature size and resolution. Although this 3CL was pioneered with 2-photon excitation, the ultimate goal is to use thin films with linear excitation, such that it is compatible with industrial requirements. We will discuss the first thin-film 3CL studies, which are a promising step towards large-area patterning.
Plasma etch technology is an integral and indispensible part of patterning technology that has enabled continuous scaling in the semiconductor industry for more than forty years. Advancement in plasma-etch technology, along with other semiconductor process technologies, has brought the state-of-the-art semiconductor technology, the so-called 22 nm node of complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) technology, into mass production. This 22 nm node CMOS technology features a three-dimensional (3-D) FinFET, a metal one pitch of about 90 nm and copper/low-k interconnects. The next generation of 14 nm node CMOS technology is expected to be brought into mass production in the first quarter of 2014.
Accurate measurement in-situ and in real-time of film thickness during Reactive Ion Etching (THE) can lead to new levels of process control. The two techniques described are used to stop an etch close to an interface less than 5Onm and have an accuracy of 3nm and 8nm respectively. The long term goal etch tailoring depends on pin-pointing in real-time the film remaining to be etched. With etch tailoring process parameters can be changed to improve product quality.
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