• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.7-12
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• 2012

Chemical mechanical polishing(CMP) technology is faced with the challenge of processing new electronic materials. This paper focuses on the balance between chemical and mechanical reactions in the CMP process that is required to cope with a variety of electronic materials. The material properties were classified into the following categories: easy to abrade(ETA), difficult to abrade(DTA), easy to react(ETR) and difficult to react(DTR). The chemical and mechanical balance for the representative ETA-ETR, DTA-ETR, ETA-DTR and DTA-DTR materials was considered for defect-free surfaces. This paper suggests the suitable polishing methods and examples for each electronic material.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.5-9
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• 2002

Chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) has become the preferred planarization method for multilevel interconnect technology due to its ability to achieve a high degree of feature level planarity. Especially, to achieve the higher density and greater performance, shallow trench isolation (STI)-CMP process has been attracted attention for multilevel interconnection as an essential isolation technology. Also, it was possible to apply the direct STI-CMP process without reverse moat etch step using high selectivity slurry (HSS). In this work, we determined the process margin with optimized process conditions to apply HSS STI-CMP process. Then, we evaluated the reliability and reproducibility of STI-CMP process through the optimal process conditions. The wafer-to-wafer thickness variation and day-by-day reproducibility of STI-CMP process after repeatable tests were investigated. Our experimental results show, quite acceptable and reproducible CMP results with a wafer-to-wafer thickness variation within 400$\AA$.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2004.07b
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• pp.1283-1287
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• 2004

The design rules are being more strict with requirement of operation speed and development of IC industry. For this reason, required minimum line-width has been narrowed under sub-micron region. As the length of minimum line-width is narrowed, local and global planarization are being prominent. CMP(Chemical-Mechanical Polishing), one of the planarizarion technology, is a process which polishes with the ascent of chemical reaction and relative velocity between pad and wafer without surface defects. CMP is performed with a complex interaction among many factors, how CMP has an interaction with such factors is not evident. Accordingly, the studies on this are still carrying out. Therefore, an examination of the CMP phenomena and an accurate understanding of compositive factors are urgently needed. In this paper, we will consider of the relations between the effects of temperature which influences many factors having an effect on polishing results and the characteristics of CMP in order to understand and estimate the influence of temperature. Then, through the interaction of shown temperature and polishing result, we could expect to boost fundamental understanding on complex CMP phenomena.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.90-97
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• 1999

Chemical-Mechanical Polishing (CMP) refers to a material removal process done by rubbing a work piece against a polishing pad under load in the presence of chemically active, abrasive containing slurry. CU process is a combination of chemical dissolution and mechanical action. The mechanical action of CMP involves tribology. The liquid slurry is trapped between the wafer (work piece) and pad (tooling) forming a lubricating film. For the first step to understand material removal rate of the CMP process, the lubricational analyses were done with commercial 100mm diameter silicon wafers to get nominal clearance of the slurry film, roll and pitch angle at the steady state. For this purpose, we calculate slurry pressure, resultant forces and moments at the steady state in the range of typical industrial polishing conditions.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers C
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• v.51 no.7
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• pp.311-315
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• 2002

Chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process was required for the global planarization of inter-metal dielectric(IMD), inter-level dielectric (ILD) layers of multi-layer interconnections. In this paper, we studied the characteristics of polishing pad, which can apply shallow trench isolation (STI)-CMP process for global planarization of multi-level interconnection structure. Also, we investigated the effects of different sets of polishing pad, such as soft and hard pad. As an experimental result, hard pad showed center-fast type, and soft pad showed edge-fast type. Totally, the defect level has shown little difference, however, the counts of scratch was detected less than 2 on JR111 pad. Through the above results, we can select optimum polishing pad, so we can expect the improvements of throughput and device yield.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.16 no.6
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• pp.465-470
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• 2003

The chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process has been widely used for the global planarization of multi-layer structures in semiconductor manufacturing. The CMP process can be optimized by several parameters such as equipment, consumables (pad, backing film and slurry), process variables and post-CMP cleaning. However, the COO(cost of ownership) is very high, because of high consumable cost. Especially, among the consumables, the slurry dominates more than 40 %. In this paper, we have studied the CMP characteristics of diluted silica slurry by adding of raw alumina abrasives and annealed alumina abrasives. As an experimental result, we obtained the comparable slurry characteristics compared with original silica slurry in the view-point of high removal rate and low non-uniformity. Therefore, we can reduce the cost of consumables(COC) of CMP process for ULSI applications.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 1996.11a
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• pp.172-176
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• 1996

The rapid structural change of ULSI chip includes minimum features, multilevel interconnection and large diameter wafers. Demands for the advanced chip structure necessitates the development of enhanced deposition, etching and planarization techniques. Planarization refers to a process that make rugged surfaces flat and uniform. One of the emerging technologies for planarization is chemical mechanical polishing(CMP). Chemical and mechanical removal actions occur during CMP, and both appear to be closely interrelated. The purpose of this study is the optimal application of the slurry to the various types of device materials during CMP. We investigates the effect of slurry on CMP characteristics for thermal oxide and sputtered Al blanket wafers. Results from the polishing rate and the uniformity of residual film include mechanical and chemical reactions between several set of slurry and work material.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2004.07a
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• pp.20-23
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• 2004

As the integrated circuit device shrinks to the smaller dimension, the chemical mechanical polishing(CMP) process was required for the global planarization of inter-metal dielectric(IMD) layer with free-defect. However, as the IMD layer gets thinner, micro-scratches are becoming as major defects. Chemical-Mechanical polishing(CMP) of conductors is a key process in Damascene patterning of advanced interconnect structure. The effect of alternative commercial slurries pads, and post-CMP cleaning alternatives are discuss, with removal rate, scratch dentisty, surface roughness, dishing, erosion and particulate density used as performance metrics. Electroplated copper deposition is a mature process from a historical point of view, but a very young process from a CMP perspective. While copper electro deposition has been used and studied for decades, its application to Cu damascene wafer processing is only now gaining complete acceptance in the semiconductor industry. The polishing mechanism of Cu-CMP process has been reported as the repeated process of passive layer formation by oxidizer and abrasion action by slurry abrasives. however it is important to understand the effect of oxidizer on copper passivation layer in order to obtain higher removal rate and non-uniformity during Cu-CMP process. In this paper, we investigated the effects of oxidizer on Cu-CMP process regarding the additional volume of oxidizer.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
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• 1998.10a
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• pp.272-277
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• 1998

Chemical-Mechanical Polishing (CMP) refers to a material removal process done by rubbing a work piece against a polishing pad under load in the presence of chemically active, abrasive containing slurry. CMP process is a combination of chemical dissolution and mechanical action. The mechanical action of CMP involves tribology. The liquid slurry is trapped between the wafer(work piece) and pad(tooling) forming a lubricating film. For the first step to understand material removal rate of the CMP process, the lubricational analyses were done with commercial 100mm diameter silicon wafers to get nominal clearance of the slurry film, roll and pitch angle at the steady state. For this purpose, we calculate slurry pressure, resultant forces and moments at the steady state in the range of typical industrial polishing conditions.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.28 no.11
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• pp.1807-1812
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• 2004

The application of chemical mechanical polishing(CMP) has a long history. Recently, CMP has been used in the planarization of the interlayer dielectric(ILD) and metal used to form the multilevel interconnections between each layers. Therefore, much research has been conducted to understand the basic mechanism of the CMP process. CMP performed by the down force and the relative speed between pad and wafer with slurry is typical tribo-system. In general, studies have indicated that removal rate is relative to energy. Accordingly, in this study, CMP results will be analyzed by a viewpoint of the friction energy using friction force measurement. The results show that energy would not constant in the same removal rate conditions