NSF Award
9960188
This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will extend the photon energy range over which one performs ellipsometry to 9 eV, well beyond the current 'deep UV' systems which are limited to roughly 6.5 eV. Specifically, an instrument operating over the entire 3 eV to 9 eV photon energy range using conventional laboratory light sources is envisioned. This instrument would be used for material studies, at these higher energies, upon the wide band gap materials SiC and GaN, as well as some alternative dielectrics currently being developed. In both cases, many of the critical points characterizing the band structure are inaccessible to conventional equipment. We shall also emphasize studies of organic electronic materials, including issues such as void fraction, substrate dielectric dependence, and layer-dependent energy levels. Furthermore, this project provides a potential instrumental solution to critical issues facing the semiconductor device industry. It clearly meets the requirements identified in the National Technology Roadmap for gate dielectric metrology as being necessary but having no known solution. It is also required by 157 nm excimer laser lithography programs, one of the candidate technologies for Next Generation Lithography.
