April 18 - 20
Austin/Round Rock, TX
Joyce Lowes, Director of Emerging Materials Technology at Brewer Science will present, “New developments in underlayers and their role in advancing EUV lithography” at CMC Conference. This discussion will be featured in Session III: Immediate Challenges of Materials and Manufacturing on April 20th at 2:25 pm. You can learn more about the CMC Conference on their website. If you wish to learn more, but cannot attend the conference, please submit a request at the bottom of this page, and an expert will reach out to you shortly.
Abstract:
Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography is used to pattern the smallest features in advanced semiconductor devices. The demand for smaller devices with more capabilities requires industry innovation in EUV processes and materials. Additionally, EUV plays a critical role in the evolution of technology and enables the continuous advancement of the semiconductor roadmap, as it provides the capabilities of higher processing power while using less energy and providing higher performance. However, one of the biggest challenges facing EUV lithography is material requirements, recognizing the critical role underlayers play in the patterning of EUV lithography. Unlike bottom antireflective coatings (BARCs), reflectivity control is no longer the driving mechanism for underlayers. Now, underlayers are necessary to support resist performance and to enable scaling of the process. Underlayers that offer optimum adhesion while ensuring pattern defects are minimized are key. For pattern transfer, underlayers need to offer etch resistance beyond their predecessors and at a much reduced thickness. In this paper, a variety of material approaches are introduced that offer process and defectivity improvements for traditional EUV lithography schemes. These materials demonstrate improved process window, depth of focus, and LWR/CDU, which can be achieved across a variety of EUV patterning applications.
