Kinetic study of copper chemistry in chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) by an in-situ real time measurement technique

Abstract

<p>This work describes a systematic approach to study chemical reactions of copper in contact with various chemical agents and to construct a coherent etching rate model based on the fundamental chemistry. Reactions of copper with chemical agents were investigated by in-situ real time technique, quartz crystal microgravimetry (QCM). Kinetic processes were followed by QCM measurement and analyzed. A coherent etching rate formula was built based on the kinetic analysis of fundamental reactions. The requirement of repeated experiments for studying copper chemistry motivated us to develop a high throughput measurement system. We utilized surface plasmon resonance (SPR) imaging combined with multi flow channel or multi electrode for high throughput design. Fundamental physics of SPR technique and instrumental design will be provided in detail. We expect this study has an impact on relatively advanced area that utilizes copper, such as chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) in semiconductor process.</p>