Investigation of Acid-Catalyzed Insolubilization Reactions for Alicyclic Polymers with Carboxyl Groups

抄録

Acid-catalyzed insolubilization reactions between novel amphiphilic alicyclic polymers (named ALPHA) and aliphatic carbinols have been investigated for aqueous base-developable ArF single-layer negative resist. The combination of an ALPHA polymer (PMBH-BHMTCD) and an aliphatic carbinol (1, 4-dioxane-2, 3-diol (DD)) exhibited the highest insolubilization reactivity. It was found that the resist composed of PMBH-BHMTCD, DD, and N-trifluoromethanesulfonyloxynaphthalimide showed high dissolution rate contrast. However, the obtained patterns showed swelling distortion in the sub-pm range. FT-IR spectrometry indicated that the dominant insolubilization reaction was the crosslinking induced by acid-catalyzed etheriflcation. It is concluded that the swelling distortion in the sub-pm range was due to remaining carboxyl groups in the exposed area.