Abstract
As semiconductor-devices become more highly integrated and their geometry continues to shrink, conventional aqueous (or liquid-phase) cleaning/drying tends to collapse high-aspect-ratio fragile LSI (large-scale integrated circuit) structures due to the high surface tension of aqueous chemicals and water. The use of physical cleaning aids such as ultrasonic agitation can also cause damage to the fragile nano-structures. The process window for damage-free cleaning is becoming narrower as the device geometry shrinks every year. This makes the development of novel damage-free cleaning methods a high priority, with preferably less chemical/water consumption. In this paper, the problems of aqueous cleaning of the semiconductor surfaces are briefly reviewed and then various alternative cleaning techniques to employ multiphase flows are described and discussed which include gas-injected megasonic cleaning, high-pressure atomizing jet spray cleaning, and cryogenic aerosol cleaning. There will be more research challenges and business opportunities in the environmentally-benign multi-phase flow technologies in the near future.
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