Module 11: Photolithography

Lecture 13: Photolithography – 3 (Continued)

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In the previous lecture, we have discussed up to the process of soft baking. A soft baked photo

resist film is now photo sensitive and is ready to be exposed to the optical light source, which is

shown in steps 4 and 5 in the schematic shown in figure 12.1. It can be understood from the

schematic that a photo mask, which contains the negative or positive replica of the desired

pattern, depending on whether a negative or a positive photoresist (PR) layer is used, is now

placed on the soft baked PR coated film and is exposed to the UV light source. Thus, at this time

we need to understand in some what details about how a photo mask is made of, which shows

spatial variation in terms of transmission of light through it. It is also important to develop some

knowledge about different exposure mechanisms, which are known as the printing modes. In

order to understand printing modes, some fundamental knowledge on optics is also essential, and

for ease of understanding I will discuss the key important concepts briefly.

13.1 Photo Mask Fabrication:

Photo masks are generally Chrome coated lithographic templates on pure silica glass (or quartz)

designed to optically transfer patterns on to other substrates. This is an essential hardware

component in photolithography or any pattern replication method which uses optical means for

transferring the structure. Careful understanding the process immediately reveals that the desired

pattern is “drawn” on the photo mask itself. Further, it can also be understood that if a

topographic feature is generated on the photo resist layer, the lateral dimension of the features

will depend on the patterns created on th mask, while the vertical dimension of the pattern will

depend on the thickness of the PR layer. In simple terms, a photo mask can be compared with the

“original” in a copier (Xerox) machine.

Basically the pattern information on the mask is created in a drawing package and stored in a

database, reformatted and transferred to a “writer”, which can be a laser writer or e-beam writer.

To start creating the mask, first a quartz glass piece which is fully coated with chromium is

taken. Chromium is opaque to UV light and does not allow any light to pass. Thus, if chromium

coated glass piece is kept on the PR coated film and the UV light is turned on, the entire light

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gets absorbed in the chromium layer and no light reaches the PR layer, leaving it structurally

intact. However, if ceratin parts of the chromium layer on the quartz plate can be etched or

removed, the light will pass only over those areas (and will get absorbed over the areas where the

chromium coating is intact). This will allow light to fall only over the areas of the PR film

flowing the contour of the patterns available on the photo mask. This concept is schematically

shown in figure 13.1.

Figure 13.1: Schematic of the working of a Photo mask.

Fabrication of the photo mask therefore requires preferential removal of the chrome layer, which

should correspond to the desired pattern or structure on the photo resist surface. Interestingly, a

Photo Resist layer is used even to fabricate the photo mask. Normally, a positive photoresist is

used during mask making, which is coated on the chrome coated quartz substrate. Typically a

laser beam or an electron beam is rustered over this PR layer to generate the desired pattern.

Since a positive PR is used, the exposed areas (areas over which the electron beam or the laser

light has traveled) will wash away during development and will expose the Chrome layer

beneath it. The exposed portion of the chromium layer is then washed away in the acid etch

solution, resulting in areas through which light can pass. This type of a mask is known to have

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Dark Field Mask Color.

13.2 Chromium Etch:

After development of the PR layer, a oxygen plasma descumming is performed on the developed

photo resist layer to facilitate the Cr etching step. The effect of this light etch is to clean out the

bottom of the developed features in the resist. This ensures that there are no areas covered with a

very thin film of resist left by the developer. Subsequent acid etching removes the Cr layer from

the quartz substrate. After inspecting the etched pattern under a microscope, the photoresist layer

from the mask is also removed. In principle, the presence of the PR layer on the photo mask does

not affect its optical functionality. However, if the PR layer remains, there is likely to be direct

contact between the old resist on the mask and the new coat of resist on a wafer during contact

printing step, which may generate high friction. As a result the resist on the wafer could be torn

by sliding the wafer during alignment.

Once the photo mask is ready, the PR layer coated on the wafer can now be exposed. At this

point it becomes important to have some idea about the fundamental optics that significantly

controls the process of exposure.

13.3 Optical Exposure

One of the most important steps in the photolithography process is mask alignment. The mask is

aligned with the wafer, so that the pattern can be transferred onto the wafer surface. Each mask

after the first one must be aligned to the previous pattern. Once the mask has been accurately

aligned with the pattern on the wafer's surface, the photoresist is exposed through the pattern on

the mask with a high intensity ultraviolet light. There are three primary exposure methods:

contact, proximity, and projection. They are shown in the figure below.

13.3.1 Contact Printing

The first commercially available exposure tool developed was the contact printer introduced in

mid 1960’s. A photomask containing a pattern for an entire wafer is brought into contact with the

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wafer to be patterned, hence the name contact printer. The schematic of a contact printer is

illustrated in figure13.2A.

Figure 13.2: Schematic of the three different printing modes in photolithography: (A) Contact
Printing; (B) Proximity Printing and (C) Projection Printing
A typical contact printer system consists of the following major elements:

 A mercury arc lamp centered in a parabolic or ellipsoidal reflector to collect the lamp

light and direct the light into the aligner optics. The mercury lamp emits light from an

area a few mms across so the lamp acts like a point source.

 A cold mirror to redirect the light and provide wavelength filtration.

 A shutter to control the time the wafer is exposed to light.

 An optical integrator that creates multiple light images which are then recombined to

improve image uniformity.

 An aperture to block divergent light rays outside a controlled area.

 A turning mirror to turn the light towards the wafer.

 A condenser lens to create parallel light rays.

 The photomask.

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  The photoresist coated wafer.

A vacuum chuck which can be moved in two horizontal directions and also can undergo vertical

motion is used to bring the mask and wafer in and out of contact. In order to expose a wafer, the

photomask is loaded and rotationally aligned under an optical microscope. The rotational

alignment insures the mask edges are parallel to the front of the aligner. The wafer is then loaded

onto the wafer chuck either manually or by an autoloader. Once aligned, the wafer is brought up

into contact with the mask and the shutter opens for a controlled time for exposing. In case an

earlier pattern exists on the wafer, it will have alignment marks, typically crosses of boxes in the

center of the wafer and out toward both sides, which is discussed later.

The resolution of contact printing is obtained from Fresnel diffraction and is given by

W= 0.7  (λ z) (13.1)

Where z is the photoresist thickness.

The resolution of contact printing is good, for example for a 1 μm thick bis- arylazide -

polyisoprene photoresist layer with a 400 nm exposure W turns out to be 440nm.

Contact printing is simple and was quite popular initially. However, there are several problems

associated with it, which has made it less popular for industrial applications presently. Some

major disadvantages of contact printing is:

1) One major problem of contact printing is the transfer of particles and photoresist from

wafers onto the masks. Each time a wafer contacts a mask, flakes of photoresist and

particles are transferred from the wafer to the mask. Each subsequent exposure

progressively degrades the quality of the photomask and introduces defects to the patterns

printed on subsequent wafers.

2) The second major problem is that the wafer and mask are aligned while separated and

then brought in contact for exposure. This introduces possibility of misalignment to the

wafer.

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 3) Further, in order to insure consistent mask to wafer contact and resolution, the wafer is

held against the mask by mechanical force and a back- side nitrogen pressure. The mask

often tend to flex from the pressure. To avoid misalignment, the degree of mask flexing

must be uniform from one exposure layer to the next, or the layers will tend to become

misaligned at the edges of the wafer, as compared to the center.

13.3.2 Proximity printing

Proximity printing systems (figure 13.2B) were developed essentially to eliminate some of the

problems associated with contact printing that are discussed above. As it is clearly understood

now, the major problem in contact printing arises out of the fact that the mask and the photo

resist film come in direct contact. This has been eliminated in proximity printing, using an

illumination system that is more optimized for collimated light and allows a small gap between

the mask and wafer. Consequently, the meaning of z in equation 13.1 changes to z = (gap

distance + film thickness), and there is an associated slight loss of resolution. However, the gap

significantly reduces defects on the mask surface and during patterning by preventing the direct

mask to wafer contact. However, the lack of clamping and unclamping during alignment also

helps with alignment accuracy.

13.3.3 Projection printing

In the early seventies, the limitations and problems associated with contact and proximity

printing led to the development of projection printing systems (figure 13.2C). Projection

printing, avoids mask damage entirely. An image of the patterns on the mask is projected onto

the resist-coated wafer, which is many centimeters away. Projection printers utilize lens systems

to focus the mask image onto the wafer. The presence of the additional optical lens, in principle

makes it possible to achieve further reduction of feature size on the PR layer, in comparison to

that printed on the mask. However, many projection systems with 1:1 ratio (one-to-one systems)

are also available commercially, which reproduce an identical of the mask image on the wafer.

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An important feature to note on most projection printers is the use of scanning through a slit,

which is essential for achieving higher resolution, rather than having an optical system that is

capable of projecting the pattern for a whole wafer at one time. The use of a slit system

requires low distortion optics, only large enough to image the area over the slit. From the

fundamentals of basic optics it should be clear that larger the system area, more difficult it will

be to design a high resolution numerical aperture (NA). This problem is significantly addressed

in a slit based system. With reduction of the critical optical area by the use of the slit, typical

NA for a commercial system is ~ 0.167.

For projection printing, the minimum line width is given by the following

relation:

(13.2)

Where, NA is numerical aperture and K is a constant that depends on the property

of the Photoresist. Typically, one can connect K to the ability of the photo resist

to resolve small changes in optical intensity variation.

Projection printers that step the mask image over the wafer surface are called step-and-repeat

systems. Step-and-repeat projection printers are capable of approximately 1-micron resolution,

which essentially use the same scanning technology used in projection printers. Many

commercial projection systems use an all reflective lens system, which are known as the

Catoptric lenses. The catoptric lens system allows the use of wide exposure wavelengths without

chromatic aberration. The catoptric lens system also enabled DUV (deep-UV) exposure work

utilizing the broadband DUV output of a mercury lamp. It should be noted that projection

printing systems offer the lowest throughput.

References:

1. Scotten W. Jones, “Photolithography”, IC Knowledge LLC. 2008.

2. http://www.lithoguru.com/scientist/lithobasics.html