• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• 제5권6호
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• pp.233-236
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• 2004

Copper metallization has been used in high-speed logic ULSI devices instead of the conventional aluminum alloy metallization. One of the key issues in copper CMP is the development of slurries that can provide high removal rates. In this study, the effects of slurry chemicals and pH for slurry dispersion stability on Cu CMP process characteristics have been performed. The experiments of copper slurries containing each different alumina and colloidal silica particles were evaluated for their selectivity of copper to TaN and $SiO_{2}$ films. Furthermore, the stability of copper slurries and pH are important parameters in many industries due to problems that can arise as a result of particle settling. So, it was also observed about several variables with various pH.

• 한국전기전자재료학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국전기전자재료학회 2004년도 춘계학술대회 논문집 반도체 재료 센서 박막재료 전자세라믹스
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• pp.34-37
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• 2004

Recently advancing mobile communication tools and I.T industry, semiconductor device is requested more integrated, faster operation time and more scaled-down. Because of these reasons semiconductor device is requested multilayer interconnection. For the multilayer interconnection chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) becomes one of the most useful process in semiconductor manufacturing process. In this experiment, we focus on understand the characterize and improve the CMP technology by control of slurry flow rate. Consequently, we obtain that optimal flow rate of slurry is 170ml/min, since optimal conditions are less chemical flow and performance high with good selectivity to Ta. If we apply this results to copper CMP process. it is thought that we will be able to obtain better yield.

• 한국전기전자재료학회논문지
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• 제17권2호
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• pp.156-161
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• 2004

We investigated the effects of oxidizer additive on the performance of Cu-CMP process using commonly used tungsten slurry. In order to compare the removal rate and non-uniformity as a function of oxidizer contents, we used alumina-based tungsten slurry and copper blanket wafers deposited by DC sputtering method. According to the CMP removal rates and particle size distribution, and the microstructures of surface layer by SEM image as a function or oxidizer contents were greatly influenced by the slurry chemical composition of oxidizers. The difference in removal rate and roughness of copper surface are believed to cause by modification in the mechanical behavior of $Al_2$O$_3$abrasive particles in CMP slurry.

• 한국진공학회지
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• 제4권S1호
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• pp.102-107
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• 1995

We review the copper CVD line, via fill properties, and CMP line resistance. With CVD, trenches and vias with high aspect ratio(above 3) can be filled completely. Sputtering-reflow technique, a new method to filling copper into lines, is also reviewed to compare the CVD process.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• 제9권6호
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• pp.276-280
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• 2010

Copper(Cu) as an interconnecting metal layer can replace aluminum (Al) in IC fabrication since Cu has low electrical resistivity, showing high immunity to electromigration compared to Al. However, it is very difficult for copper to be patterned by the dry etching processes. The chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process has been introduced and widely used as the mainstream patterning technique for Cu in the fabrication of deep submicron integrated circuits in light of its capability to reduce surface roughness. But this process leaves a large amount of residues on the wafer surface, which must be removed by the post-CMP cleaning processes. Copper corrosion is one of the critical issues for the copper metallization process. Thus, in order to understand the copper corrosion problems in post-CMP cleaning solutions and study the effects of DC biases and post-CMP cleaning solution concentrations on the Cu film, a constant voltage was supplied at various concentrations, and then the output currents were measured and recorded with time. Most of the cases, the current was steadily decreased (i.e. resistance was increased by the oxidation). In the lowest concentration case only, the current was steadily increased with the scarce fluctuations. The higher the constant supplied DC voltage values, the higher the initial output current and the saturated current values. However the time to be taken for it to be saturated was almost the same for all the DC supplied voltage values. It was indicated that the oxide formation was not dependent on the supplied voltage values and 1 V was more than enough to form the oxide. With applied voltages lower than 3 V combined with any concentration, the perforation through the oxide film rarely took place due to the insufficient driving force (voltage) and the copper oxidation ceased. However, with the voltage higher than 3 V, the copper ions were started to diffuse out through the oxide film and thus made pores to be formed on the oxide surface, causing the current to increase and a part of the exposed copper film inside the pores gets back to be oxidized and the rest of it was remained without any further oxidation, causing the current back to decrease a little bit. With increasing the applied DC bias value, the shorter time to be taken for copper ions to be diffused out through the copper oxide film. From the discussions above, it could be concluded that the oxide film was formed and grown by the copper ion diffusion first and then the reaction with any oxidant in the post-CMP cleaning solution.

• Korea-Australia Rheology Journal
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• 제14권2호
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• pp.63-70
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• 2002

Chemical mechanical planarization (CMP) is the polishing process enabled by both chemical and mechanical actions. CMP is used in the fabrication process of the integrated circuits to achieve adequate planarity necessary for stringent photolithography depth of focus requirements. And recently copper is preferred in the metallization process because of its low resistivity. We have studied the effects of chemical reaction on the polishing rate and surface planarity in copper CMP by means of numerical simulation solving Navier-Stokes equation and copper diffusion equation. We have performed pore-scale simulation and integrated the results over all the pores underneath the wafer surface to calculate the macroscopic material removal rate. The mechanical abrasion effect was not included in our study and we concentrated our focus on the transport phenomena occurring in a single pore. We have observed the effects of several parameters such as concentration of chemical additives, relative velocity of the wafer, slurry film thickness or ash)tract ratio of the pore on the copper removal rate and the surface planarity. We observed that when the chemical reaction was rate-limiting step, the results of simulation matched well with the experimental data.

• 대한전기학회:학술대회논문집
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• 대한전기학회 2002년도 추계학술대회 논문집 전기물성,응용부문
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• pp.122-123
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• 2002

Cu CMP process control for global planarization of semiconductor surface were studied on a platen polisher by using an experimental copper slurry containing ceria as the abrasive component. In order to understand the process. a design of experiment was conducted. From the experiment. the effects of polishing parameters such as polishing pressure, platen speed, and speed of wafer carrier on the removal rate of copper and the uniformity in copper removal were calculated and discussed. In this study, process parameters of Cu CMP and WIWNU(Within Wafer Non Uniformity) were presented.

• 한국전기전자재료학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국전기전자재료학회 2008년도 하계학술대회 논문집 Vol.9
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• pp.113-113
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• 2008

Cu CMP (Chemical Mechanical Planarization) has been used to remove copper film and obtain a planar surface which is essential for the semiconductor devices. Generally, it is known that chemical reaction is a dominant factor in Cu CMP comparing to Silicon dioxide CMP. Therefore, Cu CMP slurry has been regarded as an important factor in the entire process. This investigation focused on understanding the effect of corrosion inhibitor on copper surface and CMP results. Benzotriazole (BTA) was used as a corrosion inhibitor in this experiment. For the surface analysis, electrochemical characteristics of Cu was measured by a potentiostat and surface modification was investigated by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). As a result, corrosion potential (Ecorr) increased and nitrogen concentration ratio on the copper surface also increased with BTA concentration. These results indicate that BTA prevents Cu surface from corrosion and forms Cu-BTA layer on Cu surface. CMP results are also well matched with these results. Material removal rate (MRR) decreased with BTA concentration and static etch rate also showed same trend. Consequently, adjustment of BTA concentration can give us control of step height variation and furthermore, this can be applicable for Cu pattern CMP.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• 제6권1호
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• pp.29-32
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• 2005

Chemical mechanical polishing is an essential process in the production of copper-based chips. On this work, the stability of hydrogen peroxide ($H_{2}O_{2}$) as an oxidizer of copper CMP slurry has been investigated. $H_{2}O_{2}$ is known as the most common oxidizer in copper CMP slurry. But $H_{2}O_{2}$ is so unstable that its stabilization is needed using as an oxidizer. As adding KOH as a pH buffering agent, stability of $H_{2}O_{2}$ decreased. However, $H_{2}O_{2}$ stability in slurry went up with putting in small amount of BTA as a film forming agent. There was no difference of $H_{2}O_{2}$ stability between pH buffering agents KOH and TMAH at similar pH value. Addition of $H_{2}O_{2}$ in slurry in advance of bead milling led to better stability than adding after bead milling. Adding phosphoric acid resulted in the higher stability. Using alumina C as an abrasive was good at stabilizing for $H_{2}O_{2}$.

• 한국전기전자재료학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국전기전자재료학회 2003년도 하계학술대회 논문집 Vol.4 No.1
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• pp.304-307
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• 2003

Replacement of aluminum by copper for interconnections in the semiconductor industry has raised a number of important issues. The integration of copper interconnection can be carried out by CMP(chemical mechanical polishing) is used to planarize the surface topography. In this experiments, we evaluated the optimization of several conditions for chemical additives during Cu CMP process. It was presented that the main cause of grown particle size is tartaric acid. The particle size was in inverse propotion to a quantity of bead and the time of milling process. The slurry stabilizer and oxidizer have been shown to have very good effect by addition in later milling process.