ION-BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

Guided by
Dr. K. Suresh Babu

Presented by
Sudama Chaurasiya Rugmani M Pratheep P Shashank Chetty S

CONTENTS:
MAGIC OF ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY LITHOGRAPHY PROCESS NEXT GENERATION LITHOGRAPHY INTRODUCTION HISTORY OF ION BEAM TECHNOLOGY ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY APPARATUS ION INTERACTIONS IONS FOR LITHOGRAPHY ??? PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF ION BEAMS REASON FOR POSITIVE IONS ??? COMPARISON WITH OTHER

MAGIC OF ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

LITHOGRAPHY PROCESS
Replication of a master pattern onto a substrate
Coat the substrate with a radiation-sensitive polymer film (a resist) Expose specific area of film to radiation, which alters properties (solubility) of film. Small Molecule Additives

Resist

Ion Beam Radiation

Positive

Develop Pattern
Negative

Strip Resist

Substrate

NEXT GENERATION LITHOGRAPHY

- Air environment Complex mask fabrication ($4k-$12k) - Resists have low sensivity High cost X-ray sources

- vacuum environment - direct write systems (software masks) -slow writting over large areas - very high system cost

INTRODUCTION
The ion-beam lithographic exposure tool is similar to that of electron-beam exposure systems. The major differences being in the source and deflection system. The key advantages of ion-beam lithography are high resolution and the fact that it can be used with resists with poor sensitivities. This implies that minimum energy is delivered to the substrate, in contrast to high energy electrons used in electron-beam lithography, which penetrate relatively deeply into the substrate and lose only a small fraction of their energy in exposing the resist. Thus, resolution in ion-beam lithography is primarily limited by the range of the secondary electrons produced as the ion loses energy in the resist.

HISTORY OF ION BEAM TECHNOLOGY

1974: Seliger and Fleming recognized potential utility of focused ion beam for maskless implantation of dopants into Si. minimum spot diameter was 3.5mm, beam energy: 60 keV 1975: Krohn and Ringo tested the feasibility of Ce, Ga, Hg as liquid sources
o

most suitable: liquid Ga ("15nm spot size, effective source diameter "200nm

1979: Seliger et al. reported a scanning ion probe system with a beam of gallium ions focused down to a diameter of 100 nm, current density 1.5A/cm2 (high brightness)

1982: Anazawa et al. constructed a 35 kV Ga-source SIM (Scanning ion microscope).

surface-sensitive SIM images

1985: Orloff and Sudraud proposed focused ion beam system for lithography and implantation with 10nm source 1985: Kato et al. pointed out advantages of the FIB technology for the fabrication of sub-micron structures and other maskless processes, including

scanning ion microscopy maskless ion implantation maskless etching and deposition resist exposure (lithography)

ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY APPARATUS

Ion Beam Source

Ion Optics

Ion energies : 20 eV - 200 KeV

Beam Current : up to 500 A/cm2

Ion Specimens : H, He, Ar, Hf, Ga, Si, Au, Co, Pr, P+, BF2+, etc

Vacuum Chamber

ION INTERACTIONS
ION-RESIST INTERACTION,
SHOWING

*SPUTTERING OF NEUTRAL ATOMS, *EMISSION OF ELECTRONS, *LATTICE DAMAGE, *HEAT GENERATION, *IMPLANTATION.

In addition, the beam can generate secondary electrons that participate in bond breaking reactions in resist molecules.

IONS FOR LITHOGRAPHY ???

Ions have two principal features that make their use in Lithography valuable to consider resolution and sensitivity The resolution is intrinsically higher than for electrons because electrons suffer from the so-called "proximity" effect ( developed pattern, is wider than the scanned pattern). The lateral scattering of electrons and the creation of energetic secondary electrons both serve to broaden the effective size of a focused beam as it penetrates a resist. In addition, backscattering of electrons from the resist or from the underlying substrate (If the resist is thin) provides a broad background about the incident beam. As a result one feature tend to smear into a neighboring feature with a loss of contrast.

Ions scatter much less and produce secondary electrons of only very low energy, thus reducing the spreading of exposure features in a resist to ~<100 A. The ions penetrate the material relatively constant while EUV or X-ray lithography, which exhibit an exponential reduction in dose with depth. The penetration depth of the ion beam is well defined and can be varied by changing the ion energy. This is a unique characteristic which allows multi-level structures to be formed in one layer of resist. Because ions are far heavier than electrons, ions can gain a high momentum. For the same energy, the momentum of the ion is about 370 times larger.

PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF ION BEAMS

For slow heavy ions (e.g., 30 keV Ga+), the interaction process is that
altering the surface structure of a material, modifying surface chemistry, and removing atoms from the surface through sputtering.

The primary interaction of fast lighter ions (e.g., 100 keV3 MeV protons) is that

deep penetration into the material, with a minimal amount of surface disruption.

REASON FOR POSITIVE IONS ???

The diameter of an ion is much greater, of order 10-10 m, about the size of an atom. Generally, the diameter of a negative ion is somewhat greater than that of a positive ion. The radius of almost all negative ions is around (1.32.5) 10-10 m, while the radius of positive ions is about (0.1 1.7) 10-10 m. For example, the radius of a potassium ion, K+, is 0.133 nm, while the radius of Cl- is 0.181 nm.

COMPARISON WITH OTHER

FURTHER CONTENTS
THREE BASIC OPERATING MODES MAJOR COMPONENTS TYPES OF ION-BEAM LITHOGRAPHY FOCUSED ION BEAM TECHNOLOGY PROBLEMS IN USING FOCUSED ION BEAM

THREE BASIC OPERATING MODES

Emission of secondary ions and electrons FIB imaging, low ion current Sputtering of substrate atoms FIB milling, high ion current Chemical interactions (gas assisted) FIB deposition.

 IMAGING ETCHING DEPOSITION

MAJOR COMPONENTS

Upper (condenser) lens : ions are focused and into parallel beams. Mass separator: filter out unwanted ion species Drift tube: eliminates the ions that are not directed vertically. Lower (objective) lens: helps in reducing the spot size and in improving the focus. Electrostatic beam deflector: controls the final trajectory or landing location of the ions on the substrate. Nozzle: provide low energy non-focused electrons to neutralize the charged substrate. Multi-channel plate (MCP): recording the secondary electron emission and thereby, helps in viewing the substrate

All the components are usually placed in a low-pressure chamber evacuated to the 10-7 Torr. To prevent interference of the focused ions with particles in the chamber.

TYPES OF ION-BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

(a)Focused ion beam lithography, (b)Proximity ion-beam lithography, (c) Ion projection lithography.

FOCUSED ION BEAM TECHNOLOGY

Developed in the late 1970s. Utilizes slow focused heavy ion beam. (e.g., 30 keV Ga+ ions). The beam itself is powerful enough to etch away material. Therefore no resist and developing is needed. Used to sputter atoms or structurally modify the surface of a material to produce topographically or structurally modified surface patterns. High-speed fabrication. Imaging resolution with Ga ions is limited to ~5 nm.

FOCUSED ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

point beam can be focused to a fine spot (10 nm) from a bright point source and deflected on the surface, in an arrangement called focused ion beam (FIB),to expose the resist directly without a mask.

NANOSTRUCTURES BY FOCUSED ION BEAM INDUCED DEPOSITION

PROBLEMS IN USING FOCUSED ION BEAM

DEFLECTION OF BEAM

That is the time required for beam to find a new location in response to a new deflection signal more than for electron.

STATISTICS AND MASK WRITING TIME.

The writing time increases inversely as the square of the focused beam diameter.

Both are related to writing speed

FURTHER CONTENTS
FIB APPLICATION IN TEM ADVANTAGES PROXIMITY ION-BEAM LITHOGRAPHY ION PROJECTION LITHOGRAPHY ION SOURCES GAS FIELD IONIZATION SOURCE LIQUID METAL ION SOURCES ADVANTAGES OF LMIS GALLIUM: LIQUID METAL PAIR OF LIMITATIONS: SOURCE TWO MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS TO THE SOURCE

FIB APPLICATION IN TEM

1. 2. 3. Pt Deposition Coarse milling Fine milling

4.
5. 6.

Pre-thinning
Lift out Transfer of specimen to TEM

grid

ADVANTAGES
The imaging and high resolution milling capabilities of the FIB have made it possible to preselect a region and mill a TEM specimen with submicrometer precision. Because thinning is uniform across the sample surface are made available for TEM observation. TEM specimen can be prepared for analysis in 3 to 5 hours. Minimizes artifact.

PROXIMITY ION-BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

The second way to employ ion beams in lithography is to place a stencil mask in close proximity to a surface and irradiate the mask with a collimated beam of ions. This is referred to as proximity ion-beam lithography, and it is a 1:1 shadow mask printing.

ION PROJECTION LITHOGRAPHY

The third way to employ ion beams in lithography is to combine the first two techniques and use an ion optical column to project the image of the pattern of a stencil mask onto a wafer. This is called ion projection lithography (IPL), which was pioneered at Ion Microfabrication Systems (IMS) of Austria in the late 1980s

ION SOURCES

In any finely focused Ion beam system the ion source is the key element - brightness must be high, since it limits the maximum beam intensity that can be brought into a focused spot. Energy spread of ions from the source must be small because of chromatic aberration in focusing lenses. Metals that have relatively low melting temperatures and low reactivity.

The ion sources that are currently available include Al, As, Au, Be, Bi, Cs, Cu, Ga, Ge, Er, Fe, In, Li, Ni, Pb, Pd, Pr, Pt, U, and Zn. Among these, Ga is the most popular ion species used in IBL. In order to lower the melting point and to control the reactivity, alloy sources, such as PdAs, PdAsB, AuSi, and AuSiBe, are frequently used to deliver the dopants for semiconductors.

GAS FIELD IONIZATION SOURCE

The source utilizes tips comparable to those used in field ion microscopy. A sharp tip is held at a potential a few kilovolts positive with respect to an aperture. The electric field at the tip is ~V/A hydrogen molecule from the gas that enters into the region of high field is both attracted to the tip by polarization forces and ionized. when it is very close to the tip (~A) and then repelled in the repulsive field.

LIQUID METAL ION SOURCES

The source depends upon a liquid metal which wets but does not react with a solid needle. In this case, a tungsten needle welded to a tungsten wire hairpin (for heating) holds a molten gold ball at the crossing. The needle is sharpened to a radius of a few microns (a rather blunt point compared with the gas field ionization tip). Liquid gold wets the needle. When an appropriate voltage is applied between the needle and an aperture the electric field forces on the liquid can exceed the surface tension force and the liquid metal is pulled into a cone shape. At the very tip of the cone the field the field is high enough to produce field evaporation and ions of the liquid are pulled off at currents ~1-100A

CHARACTERSTICS OF LMIS
LMIS has high emission current density (high brightness) and extremely small size of emission area. These are favorable characteristics for achieving fine focus of ion beam. Stable emission process

GALLIUM: LIQUID METAL

Liquid metal sources have been made to yield ions of many different species in Al, As, Au, Be, Bi, Cs, Cu, Ga, Ge, Er, Fe, In, Li, Ni, Pb, Pd, Pr, Pt, U, and Zn. provide a source of ions of ~ 5 nm in diameter its low melting point ( 29.8 C) Its low volatility at the melting point conserves the supply of metal and yields a long source life. its low vapor pressure it has excellent mechanical, electrical, and vacuum properties. its emission characteristics enable small energy spread.

PAIR OF LIMITATIONS: SOURCE

The majority of the ions generated are blocked by the sides of the aperture, as their velocity vectors are not pointed along the direction of the beam. The ion emission current is strongly dependent on the tip radius and on the tip surface condition.

The sharper the tip is, the higher the field; and the higher the field, the stronger the ion emission.

TWO MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS TO THE SOURCE

Hanson and Siegel have introduced Major Improvement (Cold field emission guns).
First, by running the tip at 4 K and introducing H2 at ~10 -2 Torr, H2 condenses on the tungsten needle. The H2 moves along the needle to the tip where it is field desorbed as a molecular ion. This flow along the tungsten needle greatly increases the available H2 at the tip and hence the current. The system is differentially pumped to prevent Ion molecule collusions after ionization and acceleration

Secondly Its very important that that the ion beams are produced from very end of the tip ( which has least atom).

This greatly enhances the axial ion density.

FURTHER CONTENTS
MASK AND RESIST ADVANTAGES OF ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY ION CHANNELING EFFECT ON MATERIAL REMOVAL RATE EFFECT OF ANGULAR SPREAD DRAWBACK OF ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY CHALLENGING INTEREST CONCLUSION

MASK AND RESIST

The mask needs to be made from an ion-transparent substrate with a pattern made up of an absorber surface (Vive versa). The silicon acting as the absorber. Polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) is the most popular type of IBL resist.

They have the better resolution, sensitivity, and etch resistivity.

RESIST IN ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

The pattern definition is performed by the physical modification of the resist irradiated by ions. The key elements in the process are thus the employed resist and its interaction with the beam employed for exposure. Typical process flow for resist-based IBL Resist material behaves under ion beam irradiation largely depends on the form of energy deposition.

MASK PREPARATION IN ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

The main property required for membrane Preparation is Coefficient of Thermal expansion and Young modulus: For this most preferred is Silica, Alumina and Gold.

Alumina exhibit very low etch rate with favorable Coefficient of thermal expansion and young modulus.

ADVANTAGES OF ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

Comparison of limiting resolutions
1.0 0.9 0.8 0.7

X-RAY OPTICS ION

contrast

0.6 0.5

E-BEAM
0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.0 0.01

multilayer resist single layer resist

0.1

Line Width [m]

AN ARRAY OF HIGH ASPECT RATIO (L/B ratio) SILICON TIPS FABRICATED USING P-BEAM WRITING

ION CHANNELING
When ions are implanted along the principal crystalline axis, they may collide with lattice atoms in a similar way. At each collision, the ion suffers only small-angle scattering and can penetrate the solid to deeper distances. This phenomenon is called CHANNELING. since the diameter of a positive ion is 0.02 0.34 nm, if a channel presents an opening greater than the ion diameter then the ion can be implanted in the open crystalline direction to a greater depth.

EFFECT ON MATERIAL REMOVAL RATE

Ion dose: A threshold value exists.

3 x 1016 cm-3

Threshold

More (=> swelling)

Less (=> net MRR)

48

MATERIAL REMOVED BY EACH PARTICLE (ION)

Material removal rate m Particle velocity V (known) Particle diameter d (known) Particle indentation depth w (known) Semi contact radius of the indented surface a Angle subtended by the arc at the center of the particle 2 Area ploughed by the particle in the direction A.

EFFECT OF ANGULAR SPREAD

25000

TRIM 20000 simulation

15000

number of events at wafer (=proton dose)

400keV proton slit pattern membrane 10m wafer

10000

slit width = 1m 0.8 0.6 0.4 0.2 develop until this dose region 0.1 0.05

5000 0.02 0

-1.0

-0.8

-0.6

-0.4

-0.2

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

Distance from slit center [m]

DRAWBACK OF ION BEAM LITHOGRAPHY

Ion-beam lithography is not without its drawbacks, especially when compared to electron-beam lithography. Shot noise is a major issue for ion-beam lithography, just as it is for electron-beam lithography. Since energetic ions carry enough energy to displace crystal lattice atoms, they can also cause considerable damage to the substrate when subjected to very thin resists. Due to interaction of ions with each other within the ion optical column leads to resolution limit issues.

CHALLENGING INTEREST
New technology with no commercial instruments available as yet Difficulties in focusing MeV ions to sub-100nm dimensions With the advent of compact magnetic quadrupole lens systems, these difficulties have recently been overcome first prototype p-beam writer has recently been designed and constructed at Centre for Ion Beam Applications (CIBA), Singapore.

CONCLUSION
Ion

beam lithography is not yet a technology that is needed at the feature sizes of integrated circuits currently being produced. Its used in various applications like doping, photomasks repair, material addition, (re)deposition, etc. It is very low on the learning curve in comparison to other advanced techniques such as e-beam or X-ray lithography. Its major advantage of high spatial resolution because of the absence of a proximity effect will become important when feature sizes drop.

REFERENCE
Nanofabrication: Principles, Capabilities and Limits by Zheng Cui (2008). Micro-Nanofabrication Technologies and Application by Zheng Cui (2005). Principles of Lithography by Harry J. Levinson (2010). Focused ion beam system: Basics and Applications by Nan yao (2007).

NANOSCALE PAINTING (ART OF THE FUTURE), USING FOCUSED ION BEAM (BY FELDMAN AND HAGLUND)
6 microns

8 microns

line width in the letters of the word Washington is 100 nm (close to the resolution limit)