Modeling Line Edge Roughness in Templated, Lamellar Block Copolymer Systems

Published

December 11, 2012

Author(s)

Paul N. Patrone, Gregg M. Gallatin

Abstract

Block copolymers offer an appealing alternative to current lithographic techniques with re- gard to fabrication of next generation microprocessors. However, if copolymers are to be useful on an industrial manufacturing scale, they must meet or exceed lithography specifications for placement and line edge roughness (LER) of resist features. Here we use a field theoretic ap- proach, based on the Leibler-Ohta-Kawasaki energy functional, to model the LER of lamellar microdomain interfaces in a strongly segregated block copolymer system. We consider a melt with a finite number of microdomains between parallel, template walls and derive formulas for the interface LER and sidewall angle variation (SAV) as functions of the Flory Huggins parameter χ , the index of polymerization N , and distance from the template wall. Our pertur- bative approach yields explicit expressions for the dominant contributions to LER, namely, (i) an interface tension arising from the repulsive interaction between different monomer species, and (ii) a stretching energy associated with the deformation of the polymers near an interface. Our results suggest that in order to meet the target LER goals at the 15, 11, and 6 nm nodes, χ must be increased by a factor of at least 5 above currently realized values.

Citation

Macromolecules

Volume

45

Issue

23

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1021/ma301421j

Citation

Patrone, P. and Gallatin, G. (2012), Modeling Line Edge Roughness in Templated, Lamellar Block Copolymer Systems, Macromolecules, [online], https://doi.org/10.1021/ma301421j (Accessed April 19, 2024)