Photolithographic structure generation process

US6042993A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• Siemens Aktiengesellschaft · DE

Inventors

• Rainer Leuschner · Regensburg, DE
• Ewald Karl Michael Günther · Regenstauf, DE
• Albert Hammerschmidt · Erlangen, DE
• Gertrud Falk · Erlangen, DE

Key dates

• Filing date: Aug 7, 1997
• Grant date: Mar 28, 2000
• Expiry date: Aug 7, 2017

Classification

• Technology area (CPC Y): Emerging Cross-Sectional Technologies
• CPC primary: Y10S977/859
• WIPO field: Optics
• WIPO sector: Instruments

Abstract

In a process for photolithographic generation of structures in the sub-200 nm range, a layer of amorphous hydrogen-containing carbon (a-C:H) with an optical energy gap of <1 eV or a layer of sputtered amorphous carbon (a-C) is applied as the bottom resist to a substrate (layer thickness .ltoreq.500 nm); the bottom resist is provided with a layer of an electron beam-sensitive silicon-containing or silylatable photoresist as the top resist (layer thickness .ltoreq.50 nm); the top resist is structured by means of scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) or scanning force microscopy (SFM) with electrons of an energy of .ltoreq.80 eV; and then the structure is transferred to the bottom resist by etching with an anisotropic oxygen plasma and next is transferred to the substrate by plasma etching.