A Novel Method to Reduce Specific Contact Resistivity of TiSix/n+-Si Contacts by Employing an In-Situ Steam Generation Oxidation Prior to Ti Silicidation

Abstract

Due to extremely tight Contacted Poly Pitch (CPP) in sub-10 nm nodes, specific contact resistivity ( ρ <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">c</sub> ) has become the main concern for further improvement of transistor performance. Both the reduction of Schottky barrier heights (SBHs) and the enhancement of surface dopant concentration (N <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">s</sub> ) are considered as the most effective approaches to reduce ρ <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">c</sub> . In this work, a novel in-situ steam generation (ISSG) oxidation process prior to Ti silicidation is proposed to achieve an enhanced N <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">s</sub> value, thanks to the segregation of P at the surface of n <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">+</sup> -Si. Refined Transmission Line Model (RTLM) structures were fabricated to extract the ρ <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">c</sub> accurately and reliably. The dopant redistribution of P was characterized by both secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) and spreading resistance probe (SRP). Compared to control samples, the ρ <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">c</sub> value for samples with 4 nm ISSG SiO <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sub> is reduced from 2.91×10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-8</sup> to 1.90×10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-8</sup> Ω-cm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> , and this is attributed to the enhancement of N <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">s</sub> value.