By dry-etching (EPO)

This invention relates to a method of selectively treating the surface of an article comprising silicon in part and either silica or silicon nitride in part wherein either the silicon or the silicon compound is etched at a greater rate or a fluoropolymer is deposited on the article by placing the article...     

A method and apparatus for modifying a surface, by either plasma etching the surface or plasma depositing a material thereon, by using vacuum ultraviolet radiation to control the modification of the surface.

Selective plasma vapor etching process for performing operations on a solid body formed of at least two different materials capable of being vapor etched exposed at, at least, one surface of the body, with the body being disposed in a chamber having a partial vacuum therein. A gas plasma is created within...     

Method of anisotropically etching a semiconductor substrate (32). The substrate (32) is placed in an evacuated reaction chamber (50) and exposed to a gas plasma (63) which has been excited with an AC source having a frequency greater than 0 Hz but less than 300 KHz. The pressure in the chamber, and chamber...     

A silicon oxide, nitride, and/or oxynitride surface on a substrate is selectively etched at a rate greater than that of the substrate by a reactive ion etching employing a gaseous mixture containing a fluorocarbon and a second gas capable of supplying hydrogen.

This invention relates to a pattern-forming process using a radiation sensitive chalcogenide layer composed of a laminate of amorphous chalcogenide layer (2) and thin silver layer (3), and discloses a pattern-forming process characterized by etching out an amorphous chalcogenide layer (22) not doped...     

A parallel-plate type gas plasma etching apparatus for etching a workpiece having a multilayer structure having a high etch rate ratio. A pair of parallel-plate electrodes are disposed in a reactor. A workpiece to be etched is disposed upon one of the electrodes. The reactor is held at a predetermined...     

A method for producing a semiconductor device has the steps of forming an insulating film on an uneven surface of a semiconductor body; and dry etching the insulating film by using as an etchant a gas containing carbon-halogen bonds and hydrogen, whereby the surface of said insulating film is smoothed.

A dry-etching method for working SiO.sub.2, phospho-silicate glass, Si, Mo, W, Cr, TiW, Si.sub.3 N.sub.4 or the like by the use of a glow discharge plasma involves the steps of introducing He, Ar, N.sub.2, O.sub.2 or a mixed gas thereof into a reaction chamber from the outside; and effecting the plasma...     

Direct Moat Isolation for VLSI integrated circuit structures is formed by growing oxide over the entire substrate area, and then cutting windows in the oxide, using an anisotropic polymer-free oxide etch, where moat regions are to be formed. To prevent polysilicon filamentation, gate patterning is performed...     

A parallel-plate type gas plasma etching apparatus for etching a workpiece having a multilayer structure having a high etch rate ratio. A pair of parallel-plate electrodes are disposed in a reactor. A workpiece to be etched is disposed upon one of the electrodes. The reactor is held at a predetermined...     

A method of etching a variable thickness material on a substrate through an opening or openings is disclosed. The method includes a first etch step in which the material is isotropically etched until the substrate material is first exposed defining a first end point. Thereafter, a second anisotropic...     

A highly selective--greater than 100 to 1--etch for silicon, tantalum, tantalum silicide and tantalum nitride is achieved by using polyatomic halogen fluorides. The selectivity is achievable without employing plasmas or wet etching.

Holes in substrates are produced by a photolithography-plasma dry etching method employing a positive photoresist mask such as poly(methyl methacrylate) which is capable of being isotropically eroded by plasma action. The result is simultaneous anisotropic etching of the substrate and isotropic erosion...     

A planarizing process for producing a passivation or insulating layer immediately underlying an upper metallized layer on the surface of an integrated circuit having very large radius of curvature steps, thus providing a reliable base for the metallized layer. The process is comprised of the steps of...     

A bipolar or MOS semiconductor device is produced by self-alignment by (a) forming an insulating film on a semiconductor substrate, (b) forming a first conductive film, on the semiconductor substrate and (c) forming a first masking film having a window. The conductive film is then (d) anisotropically...     

An etching method for fabricating a contact hole in an insulating layer between multi-layered wiring layers of a semiconductor device. Etching is performed by chemical dry etching, in which the plasma of the etchant gas is formed in a separate chamber and fed to the etching chamber. The substrate is...     

This specification discloses a self-aligned manufacturing method of a Schottky gate FET. This method comprises the steps: forming a gate metallic layer on a semiconductor substrate and a mask overhanged on the metallic layer; ion-implanting impurity ions into the semiconductor substrate using the mask...     

The specification describes a process for treating patterned VLSI lithographic masks to retain their shape during processing of VLSI wafers. The process avoids the common postbake treatment which tends to cause sagging of the sidewalls of the mask. Retention of vertical sidewalls on the mask edges has...     

A method for plasma etching of TiO.sub.2, using a mixture of oxygen and a fluorine-bearing species, preferably CF.sub.4. This mixture gives good selectivity over aluminum and photoresist, and approximately unity selectivity over silica or silicon nitride. Use of a chlorine-containing species is also...     

Disclosed herein is a selective epitaxial growth method for forming an opening, utilizing anisotropic dry etching, in a silicon oxide film formed on a silicon substrate and epitaxially growing a silicon layer selectively in the opening. The anisotropic dry etching is performed employing a mixed gas of...     

A dry-etching process comprising dry-etching treatment of semiconductor material by action of a gas and, if necessary, cleaning treatment, characterized in that at least one of the dry-etching and cleaning treatments is conducted under action of a gas composed essentially of a fluorinated ether.

A process of forming conductive lines of fine dimensions over a substrate having topographical features without the formation of conductive stringers is disclosed. Openings of the desired dimensions overlying the topographical features are lithographically defined in a layer of planarizing dielectric...     

A method of patterning a thin film by dry etching is disclosed in which, in order for a thin alumina film to have a predetermined pattern, the thin alumina film is selectively removed by carrying out the ion beam etching which uses a carbon fluoride gas, while using a photoresist film as a mask.

In a process for etching by reactive ion etching, a ceramic partially masked by an organic photoresist, an etch gas containing SF.sub.6, a noble gas and a small percentage of a carbon-containing gas is used.

A process of forming improved ohmic contacts is disclosed. Substrates having contact openings formed in a dielectric layer thereon are cleaned under vacuum with HF/H.sub.2 O vapor wherein the temperature of the vapor is at least about 5.degree. C. lower than that of the substrate. The cleaned substrates...     

According to the present invention, there is used a usual reactive ion etching apparatus (as shown in FIG. 1) including a vacuum vessel (1), exhaust means (2), etching gas supply means (4), plasma generating electrodes (6) and high frequency power supply (7). Substance having a catalytic action (8) is...     

A gaseous mixture of SF.sub.6, a nitriding gas component and an oxidizer gas component is disclosed as an effective SiO.sub.2 etchant having enhanced selectively for use in either the plasma or reactive ion etch process. By adding an oxidizing gas to the SF.sub.6 nitriding gas plasma etchant, the selectively...     

A process for the modification of substrate surfaces is described, wherein etching or deposition at a surface occurs only in the presence of both reactive species and a directed beam of coherent light.

A method of selectively tailoring the slope of via hole sidewalls. A first polyimide layer (in which the vias are to be formed) is covered by a strippable layer, and the two layers are isotropically etched. By varying the thickness of the strippable layer with respect to that of the polyimide layer,...     

A process for forming an ultrafine pattern on a surface of a substrate, which includes steps of irradiating the substrate surface with radiation modulated according to information to be patterned, subjecting the substrate surface to deposition with a material reactive or not with the substrate, and subjecting...     

The formation of elongated structures, such as lines, having a linewidth substantially less than one micrometer is described. An elongated structure of a first material having opposed sides, a rounded surface between the sides and a width typically of about one micrometer or greater is formed on a substrate....     

A new process for plasma etching silicon oxides in integrated circuit structures. A chemistry comprising both oxygen and nitrogen trifluoride is used, with oxygen the dominant component. This provides excellent selectivity to silicon. This etch chemistry also erodes photoresist rapidly, so that it is...     

A local interconnect system for VLSI integrated circuits. After titanium is deposited for self-aligned silicidation of exposed moat and gate regions in a nitrogen atmosphere, a hardmask is deposited and patterned over the titanium. When a conductive titanium nitride layer is formed overall, it will already...     

A dry-etching method for performing anisotropic etching on a semiconductor substrate by employing an etching gas together with a film-forming gas while irradiating light or an X-ray on the semiconductor substrate. In this method at least one of the etching gas or film-forming gas is excited in a separated...     

A magnetically-enhanced, variable magnetic field, RIE mode plasma etch process for etching materials such as dielectrics and polycrystalline, is disclosed. The variable magnetic field permits optimization of selected characteristics such as etch rate, etch selectivity, ion bombardment and radiation damage,...     

A method for planarizing an insulating layer overlying an irregular topographic substrate, e.g., a conductive layer, is planarized by use of a sacrificial planarization layer. The planarization layer is removed using an oxygen-containing plasma generated in a parallel electrode reactor operating at a...     

A dry-etching method for etching materials of the silicon group comprises: providing the material to be etched in a reaction chamber; supplying a mixed gas as the etching gas comprising carbon fluoride, oxygen and another gas wherein the other gas is a partially halogenated hydrocarbon; and thereafter...     

An improved process for self-aligned contact window formation in an integrated circuit leaves a "Stick" of etch stop on vertical sidewall surfaces to be protected. The technique includes, in the preferred embodiment, a layer of oxide over active areas and on top of the gate electrode of a transistor....     

A process described provides a sloped contact etch. The process has the steps of: etching a substrate then removing the polymer that is produced during the substrate etch. These two steps are alternated until a desired depth is reached. Next, the resist is etched followed by an etch of the substrate....     

A pattern is formed by providing a reaction field in which a photo-induced reaction proceeds when a substrate is irradiated with light so as to form a pattern on the substrate, and setting, in the reaction field, conditions for establishing a nonlinear relationship between the intensity of the light...     

Disclosed is a method for microwave plasma processing characterized by providing a plasma processing period of time having no radio-frequency voltage applied to the sample stage. Particularly, if the present invention is used for the shaping by etching of the conductive material layer provided on an...     

A composition for a plasma etch of tin oxide is disclosed that comprises a major proportion of chloroform gas and a minor proportion of a polymer suppressant gas such as boron trichloride or chlorine. A novel reactor is provided in connection with the etchant of the invention that has refractory components...     

A method for patterning small-geometry contacts with sloped sidewalls in integrated circuit fabrication. A multilayer resist process is used, and the spacer layer is undercut by overexposure and overdevelopment at the pattern transfer stage. This provides a cantilever etch mask structure, without the...     

A plasma process using a reactant gas mixture of fluorinated etching gas and oxygen for selectively etching a thin film of material such as silicon nitride with high selectivity for a silicon oxide underlayer and, preferably, for a photoresist overlayer mask.

A phototreating method comprises the steps of introducing a photoreactive gas into a chamber housing a workpiece, emitting first light substantially perpendicularly to a surface of the workpiece, and emitting second light substantially perpendicularly to the surface of the workpiece simultaneously with...     

An ion beam is allowed to hit the surface of a target and the resulting forward scattered particle beam is then allowed to hit the surface of a workpiece, thereby etching or modifying the surface of the workpiece or depositing a film on the surface of the workpiece. By bombardment of ions with the target,...     

A process for etching silicon nitride which utilizes free radicals from a remote plasma generated using a fluorine containing gas; and hydrogen; to produce an etch which is selective to selected materials, for example, silicon and silicon dioxide.

A tapered profile is obtained in oxide etched in a plasma glow discharge by switching the RF power between the side and lower electrodes in a tri-electrode reactor. The etch is isotropic while the RF power is applied to the side electrode and is anisotropic when the RF power is applied to the lower electrode.

A carbon enhanced vapor etching process which eliminates resist development, avoids contact with wet chemicals and plasma, and employs simple universally available process equipment. The process is based on the discovery that the etch rate of silicon dioxide in hydrogen fluoride is greatly enhanced in...     

The present invention is a contact etch method which simultaneously smoothes a reflowed oxide profile so that separate phanarization photoresist coat and etch steps are unnecessary. This method is characterized in that it is fast, uses only one photoresist mask layer, etches contacts to poly and to substrate...     

A method for differentially etching silicon nitride, preferably formed in a hydrogen free environment, wherein hydrogen is implanted into various regions of the silicon nitride. The silicon nitride may then be etched by a number of different etchants, some of which will etch the implanted regions appreciably...     

A process for making borderless contacts through an insulating layer to active regions of a semiconductor device is disclosed. After deposition of a silicon nitride layer and an insulation glass layer on a substrate coating semiconductor devices, the contact windows are etched. The windows are etched...     

An SRAM using TiN local interconnects. This permits the moat parasitic capacitance to be reduced, and also avoids use of metal jumpers, resulting in increased density.

A first etching for large side etching is conducted while maintaining the temperature of an article to be etched at a first temperature, and a second etching for small side etching is then conducted while maintaining the article to be etched at a second temperature lower than the first temperature. This...     

An article to be etched is contacted with a plasma of a mixed gas containing an etching gas and a film forming gas or a surface modification gas at a low temperature to effect the dry etching of the article, whereby the selectivity of etching can be made very high and the inclination angle of the side...     

A process and structure for depositing metal lines in a lift-off process is disclosed. The process comprises the deposition of a four-layer structure or lift-off stencil, comprising a first layer of a lift-off polymer etchable in oxygen plasma, a first barrier layer of hexamethyldisilizane (HMDS) resistant...     

A semiconductor wafer processing apparatus has a processing housing including a pair of coaxial hollow cylindrical members each defining an inner cylindrical chamber for directing a treatment medium toward a wafer and an annular chamber for withdrawing the treatment medium. A wafer support which can...     

Contact etching is simplified by including a conformal etch stop layer underneath the interlevel or multilevel oxide (MLO). Etching through the unequal thickness of the MLO with sufficient overetching to reliably clear the thickest parts of the MLO layer will therefore not damage the silicon contact...     

A plasma etching method including the steps of mounting an object to be processed in a region formed between one electrode and an other electrode, introducing an etching gas into the region, setting an area of the contact surface of the other electrode, which is in contact with the etching gas, to a...     

A self-aligned, sloped contact, through BPSG and thick TEOS (at least 200 nm but preferably 300-500 nm or more). Sloping is achieved through exploitation of BPSG and TEOS etch characteristics, to independently form concave and convex sidewalls, respectively. Self-alignment is obtained through thick conformal...     

Surface treatment is applied to a substrate by supplying thereto excited molecules in which the vibrational energy level is excited. SF.sub.6, O.sub.2, N.sub.2, etc., are used as the excited molecules and supplied to the substrate as beams. This method is particularly suitable for the surface treatment...     

A phototreating method comprises the steps of introducing a photoreactive gas into a chamber housing a workpiece, emitting first light substantially perpendicularly to a surface of the workpiece, and emitting second light substantially perpendicularly to the surface of the workpiece simultaneously with...     

A dry etching method is disclosed, in which the pressure of etching gas in a reaction chamber, the bias voltage applied to article to be etched, and the temperature of the article to be etched object are set so that the etching rate for the article to be etched is greater than 0.2 .mu.m/min, a ratio...     

A reactive ion etching method is described in which a silicon compound film formed on an underlying layer or a substrate is etched through a mask layer by a two-stage procedure. In the two-stage procedure, part of the silicon compound film is first etched with a gas containing a hydrogen-free carbon...     

A method to anisotropically etch an oxide/poly/oxide or an oxide/poly/oxide sandwich structure on a silicon wafer substrate in situ, that is, using a single parallel plate plasma reactor chamber and a single inert cathode, with a variable gap between cathode and anode. This method has an oxide etch step...     

A method to anisotropically etch an oxide/silicide/poly sandwich structure on a silicon wafer substrate in situ, that is, using a single parallel plate plasma reactor chamber and a single inert cathode, with a variable gap between cathode and anode. This method has an oxide etch step and a silicide/poly...     

A method of forming a contact structure comprising a first step whereby a contact hole is formed with an etching stopper film by way of self-alignment, a second step whereby the etching stopper film is removed from the contact hole, and a third step of metallization, whereby unnecessary intermediate...     

A dry etching method for etching a substrate such as semiconductors. A vacuum ultraviolet radiation or soft X-rays is used as a photon beam source for generating a reaction of dry etching, and also an etching gas in introduced into a reaction chamber after being activated by a microwave radiation, whereby...     

A two step method of etching a silicon nitride layer carrying a surface oxygen film from a substrate in a plasma reactor employs the steps of (1) a breakthrough step of employing a plasma of oxygen free etchant gases to break through and to remove the surface oxygen containing film from the surface of...     

A method for dry etching enabling good anisotropic processing even at a wafer cooling temperature closer to room temperature than with conventional low temperature etching. Etching is carried out using an etching gas including a compound containing oxygen (O) as a component element and a compound containing...     

An etch stop player (22) for permitting distinguishing between two similar layers (20, 24), such as two oxide layers, during etching is provided. The etch stop layer comprises a silicon-oxyhalide polymer, preferably a silicon-oxyfluoride polymer. Use of the polymer as an etch stop layer permits closer...     

In a semiconductor device manufacturing apparatus for performing an etching operation with a reaction gas, in which three electrodes, namely, upper, intermediate and lower electrodes, are arranged parallel to one another, and the intermediate electrode is in the form of a grid, having a number of through-holes,...     

A method to anisotropically etch an oxide/silicide/poly sandwich structure on a silicon wafer substrate in situ, that is, using a single parallel plate plasma reactor chamber and a single inert cathode, with a variable gap between cathode and anode. This method has an oxide etch step that utilizes C.sub.2...     

The present invention relates to a dry etching method in which the type of reactive gas used is improved and the selectively between a workpiece being etched and a substance below the workpiece is increased. A gas comprising a fluoride gas and a compound gas containing hydrogen as a constituent element...     

A method of and apparatus for manufacturing a semiconductor device are presented wherein a silicon oxide film on an intermediate semiconductor device is etched out properly without damaging the silicon, under the condition that a difference between the etching speeds of silicon and silicon oxide film...     

A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device includes the steps of forming a carbon film on a target film formed on a substrate, forming an organic film pattern on the carbon film, etching the carbon film using the organic film pattern as a mask to form a carbon film pattern, and heating the substrate,...     

A plasma treatment method and apparatus utilize various gas inlet and outlet structure arrangements to optimize treatment characteristics for a semiconductor wafer. A buffer zone is created between gas inlets and the discharge zone of the vacuum treatment chamber to enhance uniformity of gas flow. The...     

A method of forming contact windows in an insulating layer is disclosed. The contact windows extend down to an underlying metal layer which is formed under the insulating layer. The method comprises the steps of: forming an etching mask layer having openings for defining contact window regions of the...     

A dry etching method capable of performing fine patterning. A sample substrate is fixedly disposed on a table in a reactant chamber. Gas plasma produced by a gas plasma generator is introduced into the reactant chamber, and excitation light, that is, light capable of exciting inner shell electrons of...     

A dry etching method of a substrate or layer of a semiconductor or other material which includes the steps of providing a metallic chamber having an anode and a cathode which are spaced from each other and mounting the substrate or layer to be etched on the cathode, and applying a potential from a RF...     

A dry etching method whereby underlying layer selectivity and anisotropy may be prevented from deteriorating due to excessive radicals in an over-etching process. In the etching chamber of an ordinary magnetically-enhanced microwave plasma etching apparatus, the so-called ECR position at which the ECR...     

A method of tapering side walls of via holes and a tapered via hole structure for an integrated circuit is provided. Via holes having steep sidewalls are provided in an insulating layer overlying a conductive layer on a substrate, with an underlying conductive layer exposed at a bottom of each via hole....     

A method to anisotropically etch an oxide/metalsilicide/polysilicon sandwich structure on a silicon wafer substrate in situ, using a single parallel plate plasma reactor chamber and a single inert cathode, with a variable gap between cathode and anode. This method has an oxide etch step and a metalsilicide/polysilicon...     

The present invention features new etchants to be utilized in the etching, depositing and growth processes for fabricating integrated circuits. The etchants contain a new family of compounds consisting of a single molecule. The molecule contains several halogen atoms, thus eliminating the need to add...     

A dry etching method for dry etching a silicon oxide film or a multilayer oxide film thereof which enables formation of contact window to good dimensional precision and with stable etching configuration in the process of film etching at submicron level. A compound gas containing a C element or S element...     

A local interconnect system for VLSI integrated circuits. During self-aligned silicidation of exposed moat and gate regions in a nitrogen atmosphere, a conductive titanium nitride layer is formed overall. Normally this conductive layer is stripped to avoid shorting out devices. However, the present invention...     

A dry etching method by a plasma etching forms a mask pattern, having an opening up to 1 .mu.m width on a silicon oxide layer formed on a silicon substrate. The substrate is laced into a reactive chamber having an etching gas introducing means and fluorocarbon gas and hydrogen gas as the etching gas...     

A dry etching method whereby an SiO.sub.2 layer and an Si.sub.3 N.sub.4 layer may be etched with high selectivity for each other. As etching gas, such sulfur fluorides as S.sub.2 F.sub.2 are used which, when dissociated by electric discharges, will form SF.sub.x.sup.+ as a main etchant for the SiO.sub.2...     

A reactive ion etching method is described in which a silicon compound film formed on an underlying layer or a substrate is etched through a mask layer by a two-stage procedure. In the two-stage procedure, part of the silicon compound film is first etched with a gas containing a hydrogen-free carbon...     

The etching selectivity is controlled by appropriately changing the dimension of the opening of each contact holes in forming simultaneously a plurality of contact holes of different depth by etching. By forming a dent in advance underlying the region where a contact hole is to be formed, the depth of...     

The invention provides an improved dry etching method for selectively etching a silicon nitride layer 3 formed on the surface of a SiO.sub.2 layer 2 formed on a p-type semiconductor substrate, the method comprising the steps of supplying a mixed gas of HBr and ClF.sub.3 to a reaction chamber wherein...     

A dry etching method by which the surface of a variety of materials constituting a semiconductor device may be planarized or smoothed under clean state. Small-sized recesses existing on the surface of a layer of the material to be etched are filled with deposited free sulfur yielded from sulfur halides,...     

In a semiconductor device manufacturing apparatus for performing an etching operation with a reaction gas, in which three electrodes, namely, upper, intermediate and lower electrodes, are arranged parallel to one another, and the intermediate electrode is in the form of a grid, having a number of through-holes,...     

A method for dry etching for forming a contact hole in a silicon oxide interlayer insulating film is proposed, by which high etchrate, high selectivity, low pollution and low damage may be achieved. An etching gas containing cyclic saturated fluorocarbon compounds, such as octafluorocyclobutane (c-C.sub.4...     

A method and apparatus for dry etching changes at least one of the effective pumping speed of a vacuum chamber and the gas flow rate to alter the processing of an etching pattern side wall of a sample between first and second conditions. The first and second conditions include the presence or absence...     

A dry etching method which includes supplying a workpiece having an oxide portion or a nitride portion into a processing vessel, keeping said workpiece at temperatures not higher than 0.degree. C. within said processing vessel, supplying an etching gas including a first gas containing a halogen element...     

Disclosed herein is a method of dry-etching SiO.sub.2 layers and Si.sub.3 N.sub.4 layers with high selectivity. The dry etching method employs a fluorocarbon (FC) gas represented by the formula C.sub.x F.sub.y (where y<x+2) in a dry-etching system capable of generating a high-density plasma having...     

At an effective exhaust speed of 1200 liter/s, high frequency power with power surface density of 4.5 W/cm.sup.2 is made to discharge high density plasma, thereby carrying out dry etching. With a gas residence time of 100 ms or less, a gas flow rate controller is provided which has a response time substantially...     

Method employing low pressure plasma having high electron density for rapid oxide etching employing hydrogen and argon and specific electron clyclotron resonance (ECR) operating parameters in an ECR having a non-oxygen contributing environment in the reaction chamber.