Abstract
We characterized the roughness and side wall morphology of lithographically produced nanostructures of resistmultilayer materials using the recently developed three-dimensional atomic force microscopy (3D-AFM), which has an independent Z scanner intentionally tilted to a certain angle access the sidewall. In order to produce different degrees of Line Edge Roughness (LER) in a given photoresist sample, we systematically varied the Aerial Image Contrast (AIC) at a constant dose for optically imaged resists. We describe herein the effects of AIC on KrF resists that were observed by using 3D-AFM and Critical Dimension-Scanning Electron Microscopy (CD-SEM). High-resolution sidewall images and line profiles obtained by the 3D-AFM technique demonstrate its advantages to characterize the shape and roughness of device patterns throughout the development and pattern transfer process. Taken together, we demonstrate that AFM imaging can identify a trend in Sidewall Roughness (SWR) as a function of AIC effects on photoresist sample, and CDSEM imaging provided supporting evidence to establish the LER trend.
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