Study of advanced 193nm resists: Material properties and lithographic performance

Abstract

193nm lithography requires new resist formulations to achieve transparency requirements for single layer resist. In this paper, the properties of two 193nm chemically amplified resists, one based on the methacrylate chemistry and the other on the alicyclic platform have been investigated as a function of process conditions. Experiments have been focused on the different behaviors of these two resist platforms during the Soft Bake (recompaction rates) and the Post Exposure Bake (prominant mechanisms in the exposed resist areas: reaction or diffusion controlled phenomena).
The lithographic performance of the methacrylate based resist has been extensively evaluated for various bake processes, and additionnal formulation effects have been pointed out.