NSF Award
9801381
*** 9801381 Dobson This Small Business Innovation Research Phase II project will investigate highly reflective substrates that require anti-reflective coatings to minimize standing waves and maintain dimensional control. As device dimensions are reduced, this becomes more critical. Polymer anti-reflective coatings are applied by spin coating. Spin coating tends to planarize non-uniform surfaces, resulting in varying thicknesses of material over the device topography. When the coating is etched away, this can result in erosion of sidewalls, changing device dimensions. A new process is required for applying polymeric anti-reflective coatings that can produce thin, low defectivity, conformal coatings on large-area wafers substrates. This will enable the continued implementation of deep UV processes by U.S. and foreign manufacturers. Plasma CVD can be used to deposit defect-free, conformal polymer films with good anti-reflective properties. The Phase I effort successfully demonstrated the use of plasma CVD in depositing a 193 nm anti-reflective coating. In Phase II the proposer will develop chemical feedstocks for ultra-thin polymer anti-reflective coatings with high optical density at key ultraviolet wavelengths, high conformability, low amount of defects, and good resist compatibility. The proposer will identify robust plasma CVD coating deposition processes and lay the groundwork for developing a commercial plasma CVD tool in Phase III. ***
