Lithography focus/exposure control and corrections to improve CDU at post etch step

Young Ki Kim; Mark Yelverton; John Tristan; Joungchel Lee; Karsten Gutjahr; Ching-Hsiang Hsu; Hong Wei; Lester Wang; Chen Li; Lokesh Subramany; Woong Jae Chung; Jeong Soo Kim; Vidya Ramanathan; LipKong Yap; Jie Gao; Ram Karur-Shanmugam; Anna Golotsvan; Pedro Herrera; Kevin Huang; Bill Pierson

doi:10.1117/12.2045433

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2 April 2014 Lithography focus/exposure control and corrections to improve CDU at post etch step

Young Ki Kim, Mark Yelverton, John Tristan, Joungchel Lee, Karsten Gutjahr, Ching-Hsiang Hsu, Hong Wei, Lester Wang, Chen Li, Lokesh Subramany, Woong Jae Chung, Jeong Soo Kim, Vidya Ramanathan, LipKong Yap, Jie Gao, Ram Karur-Shanmugam, Anna Golotsvan, Pedro Herrera, Kevin Huang, Bill Pierson

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Proceedings Volume 9050, Metrology, Inspection, and Process Control for Microlithography XXVIII; 90501Y (2014) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2045433
Event: SPIE Advanced Lithography, 2014, San Jose, California, United States

Abstract

As leading edge lithography moves to advanced nodes in high-mix, high-volume manufacturing environment, automated control of critical dimension (CD) within wafer has become a requirement. Current control methods to improve CD uniformity (CDU) generally rely upon the use of field by field exposure corrections via factory automation or through scanner sub-recipe. Such CDU control methods are limited to lithography step and cannot be extended to etch step. In this paper, a new method to improve CDU at post etch step by optimizing exposure at lithography step is introduced. This new solution utilizes GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ factory automation system and KLA-Tencor’s K-T Analyzer as the infrastructure to calculate and feed the necessary field by field level exposure corrections back to scanner, so as to achieve the optimal CDU at post etch step. CD at post lithography and post etch steps are measured by scatterometry metrology tools respectively and are used by K-T Analyzer as the input for correction calculations. This paper will explain in detail the philosophy as well as the methodology behind this novel CDU control solution. In addition, applications and use cases will be reviewed to demonstrate the capability and potential of this solution. The feasibility of adopting this solution in high-mix, high-volume manufacturing environment will be discussed as well.

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Young Ki Kim, Mark Yelverton, John Tristan, Joungchel Lee, Karsten Gutjahr, Ching-Hsiang Hsu, Hong Wei, Lester Wang, Chen Li, Lokesh Subramany, Woong Jae Chung, Jeong Soo Kim, Vidya Ramanathan, LipKong Yap, Jie Gao, Ram Karur-Shanmugam, Anna Golotsvan, Pedro Herrera, Kevin Huang, and Bill Pierson "Lithography focus/exposure control and corrections to improve CDU at post etch step", Proc. SPIE 9050, Metrology, Inspection, and Process Control for Microlithography XXVIII, 90501Y (2 April 2014); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2045433

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