Raymond T. Lee

Characterization and optimization of metal etch processes to minimize charging damage to submicron transistor gate oxide

Two metal etch systems are compared in terms of their impacts on submicron transistor gate oxide integrity. The magnetically enhanced RIE (MERIE) system is shown to cause significant gate oxide damage with a pronounced radial dependence. This damage does not occur on wafers etched in the hexode-type RIE system. Experimental work on the MERIE system shows that the presence of the magnetic field during the aluminum overetch and barrier metal etch portion of the process is the primary cause for the observed gate oxide damage. This damage can be minimized by reducing or eliminating the magnetic field during the overetch step.<<ETX>>

Device performance and optimization for 5th- and 6th-generation microprocessors

A family of CMOS processing technologies used to produce AMDs fifth and sixth generation microprocessors (K5 and K6) is described. Some of the issues that arose during the technology development and the transfer to manufacturing are also presented. Transistor performance is compared to literature results and shown to be best in its class.