• Journal of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.390-395
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• 2004

A semiconductor manufacturing process is the complicate and dynamic process, and consists of many sub-processes. An etching process is the most important process in the semiconductor fabrication. In this paper, the decision support system based upon data mining and knowledge discovery is an important factor to improve the productivity and yield. The proposed decision support system consists of a neural network model and an inference system based on fuzzy logic Firstly, the product results are predicted by the neural network model constructed by the product patterns that represent the quality of the etching process. And the product patters are classified by expert's knowledge. Finally, the product conditions are estimated by the fuzzy inference system using the rules extracted from the classified patterns. Prediction of product qualities can be linked to each input and process variables. We employ data mining and intelligent techniques to find the best condition of the etching process. The proposed decision support system is efficient and easy to be implemented for the process management based upon expert's knowledge.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 1997.10a
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• pp.664-667
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• 1997

For higher component density per chip, it is necessary to identify and control the semiconductor manufacturing process more stringently. Recently, neural networks have been identified as one of the most promising techniques for modeling and control of complicated processes such as plasma etching process. Since wafer states after each run using identical recipe may differ from each other, conventional neural network models utilizing input factors only cannot represent the actual state of process and equipment. In this paper, in addition to the input factors of the recipe, real-time tool data are utilized for modeling of 64M DRAM s-poly plasma etching process to reflect the actual state of process and equipment. For real-time tool data, we collect optical emission spectroscopy (OES) data. Through principal component analysis (PCA), we extract principal components from entire OES data. And then these principal components are included to input parameters of neural network model. Finally neural network model is trained using feed forward error back propagation (FFEBP) algorithm. As a results, simulation results exhibit good wafer state prediction capability after plasma etching process.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.17-21
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• 2016

EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) pellicle which protects a mask from contamination became a critical issue for the application of EUV lithography to high-volume manufacturing. However, researches of EUV pellicle are still delayed due to no typical manufacturing methods for large-scale EUV pellicle. In this study, EUV pellicle membrane manufacturing method using not only KOH (potassium hydroxide) wet etching process but also a water bath was suggested for uniform etchant temperature distribution. KOH wet etching rates according to KOH solution concentration and solution temperature were confirmed and proper etch condition was selected. After KOH wet etching condition was set, $5cm{\times}5cm$ SiNx (silicon nitride) pellicle membrane with 80% EUV transmittance was successfully manufactured. Transmittance results showed the feasibility of wet etching method with water bath as a large-scale EUV pellicle manufacturing method.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.199-204
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• 2012

$SF_6$ gas is widely used for dry etching process of semiconductor and display fabrication process. But $SF_6$ gas is considered for typical greenhouse gas for global warming. So it is necessary to research relating to $SF_6$ alternatives reducing greenhouse effect in semiconductor and display. $C_3F_6$ gas is one of the promising candidates for it. We studied about etch characteristics by performing Reactive Ion Etching process of dry etching and reduced gas element exhausted on etching process using absorbent Zeolite 5A. $Si_3N_4$ thin film was deposited to 500 nm with Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition and we performed Reactive Ion Etching process after patterning through photolithography process. It was observed that the etch rate and the etched surface of $Si_3N_4$ thin film with Scanning Electron Microscope pictures. And we measured and compared the exhausted gas before and after the absorbent using Gas Chromatograph-Mass Spectrophotometry.

• Journal of information and communication convergence engineering
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.187-190
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• 2005

High aspect ratio via-hole etching process has emerged as one of the most crucial means to increase component density for ULSI devices. Because of charge accumulation in via-hole, this sophisticated and important process still hold several problems, such as etching stop and loading effects during fabrication of integrated circuits. Indeed, the concern actually depends on accumulated charge. For monitoring accumulated charge during plasma etching process, charge-up monitoring sensor was fabricated and tested under some plasma conditions. This paper presents a neural network-based technique for analyzing and modeling several electrical performance of plasma charge-up monitoring sensor.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 1997.10a
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• pp.1500-1503
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• 1997

In this paper a multiple channel EPD controller is developed which enables us to detect endpoints simultaneously in the plasma etching process operated in multiple etching chambers and its performance characteristic are investigated. for the accurate detectiion of endpoint the developed EDP controller was able to implement endpoint detectiions by integrating the existing EPD controllers with the techiques of artificial intellignet, to enhance its performance. The performance of the developed EPD controller was carried out by repeated experiments of endpoint detection in the acrual production line of semiconductor manufacturing. It's utility for endpoint detectiion was accurately evaluated in various etching process. The control capability of multiple etching chambers enhances its application compared with the existing one, and also increases the user utility os that the efficiency of operation was improved.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.169-174
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• 1996

The applications of the high density plasma sources to the etching in semiconductor fabrication process are actively studied because of the more strict requirement from the dry etching process due to shrinking down of the critical dimension. But in the oxide etching with the high density plasma sources, abundant fluorine atoms released from the flurocarbon feed gas make it difficult to get the highly selective $SiO_2/Si$ etching. In this study, to improve the $SiO_2/Si$ etch selectivity through the control of the radical loss channels, we propose the wall heating , one of methods of controlling loss mechanisms. With appearance mass spectroscopy(AMS) and actinometric optical emission spectroscopy(OES), the increase of both radicals impinging on the substrate and existing in bulk plasma, and the decrease of the fluorine atom with wall temperature are observed. As a result, a 40% improvement of the selectivity was achieved for the carbon rich feed gas.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.259-259
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• 2008

The LTCC (Low Temperature Co-fired Ceramic) technology meets the requirements for high quality microelectronic devices and microsystems application due to a very good electrical and mechanical properties, high reliability and stability as well as possibility of making integrated three dimensional microstructures. The wet process, which has been applied to the etching of the metallic thin film on the ceramic substrate, has multi process steps such as lithography and development and uses very toxic chemicals arising the environmental problems. The other side, Plasma technology like ion beam sputtering is clean process including surface cleaning and treatment, sputtering and etching of semiconductor devices, and environmental cleanup. In this study, metallic multilayer pattern was fabricated by the ion beam etching of Ti/Pd/Cu without the lithography. In the experiment, Alumina and LTCC were used as the substrate and Ti/Pd/Cu metallic multilayer was deposited by the DC-magnetron sputtering system. After the formation of Cu/Ni/Au multilayer pattern made by the photolithography and electroplating process, the Ti/Pd/Cu multilayer was dry-etched by using the low energy-high current ion-beam etching process. Because the electroplated Au layer was the masking barrier of the etching of Ti/Pd/Cu multilayer, the additional lithography was not necessary for the etching process. Xenon ion beam which having the high sputtering yield was irradiated and was used with various ion energy and current. The metallic pattern after the etching was optically examined and analyzed. The rate and phenomenon of the etching on each metallic layer were investigated with the diverse process condition such as ion-beam acceleration energy, current density, and etching time.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.221-225
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• 2014

Although gold wire bonding techniques have already matured in semiconductor manufacturing, weakly bonded wires in semiconductor chip assembly can jeopardize the reliability of the final product. In this paper, weakly bonded or failed aluminum bonding pads are analyzed using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Auger electron Spectroscopy (AES), and energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX) to investigate potential contaminants on the bond pad. We found the source of contaminants is related to the dry etching process in the previous manufacturing step, and fluorocarbon plasma etching of a passivation layer showed meaningful evidence of the formation of fluorinated by-products of $AlF_x$ on the bond pads. Surface analysis of the contaminated aluminum layer revealed the presence of fluorinated compounds $AlOF_x$, $Al(OF)_x$, $Al(OH)_x$, and $CF_x$.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.1-5
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• 2009

Typically, single-wafer wet etching is done by dispensing chemical onto the front and back side of spin wafer. The wafer is fixed by a number of chuck pins, which obstruct the chemical flow and would result in the incomplete removal of the remaining film, which can become a source of contamination in the next process. In this paper, we introduce a novel design of wafer chuck, in which chuck pins are groupped into two and each group of pins fixes the substrate alternatively. Two groups of chuck pins fix the high-speed spin substrate with non contact method using a magnetic material. The actual process has been executed to observe the effectiveness of this new wafer chuck. It was found that the new wafer chuck performed better than the conventional wafer chuck for removing the remaining film from the bevel and edge side of substrate.