Paper
26 June 2003 Dark-field high-transmission chromeless lithography
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
Dark field (i.e. hole and trench layer) lithographic capability is lagging that of bright field. The most common dark field solution utilizes a biased-up, standard 6% attenuated phase shift mask (PSM) with an under-exposure technique to eliminate side lobes. However, this method produces large optical proximity effects and fails to address the huge mask error enhancement factor (MEEF) associated with dark field layers. It also neglects to provide a dark field lithographic solution beyond the 130nm technology node, which must serve two purposes: 1) to increase resolution without reducing depth of focus, and 2) to reduce the MEEF. Previous studies have shown that by increasing the background transmission in dark field applications, a corresponding decrease in the MEEF was observed. Nevertheless, this technique creates background leakage problems not easily solved without an effective opaqueing scheme. This paper will demonstrate the advantages of high transmission lithography with various approaches. By using chromeless dark field scattering bars around contacts for image contrast and chromeless diffraction gratings in the background, high transmission dark field lithography is made possible. This novel layout strategy combined with a new, very high transmission attenuating layer provides a dark field PSM solution that extends 248nm lithography capabilities beyond what was previously anticipated. It is also more manufacturing-friendly in the mask operation due to the absence of tri-tone array features.
© (2003) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
George E. Bailey, Neal P. Callan, Kunal N. Taravade, John V. Jensen, Benjamin George Eynon, Patrick M. Martin, Henry H. Kamberian, Darren Taylor, and Rick S. Farnbach "Dark-field high-transmission chromeless lithography", Proc. SPIE 5040, Optical Microlithography XVI, (26 June 2003); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.485518
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CITATIONS
Cited by 2 patents.
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KEYWORDS
Photomasks

Opacity

Scattering

Lithography

Diffraction gratings

Scanning electron microscopy

Manufacturing

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