Polymeric electronic materials for microelectronics manufacturing: A review

Abstract

This review paper is part of a series of papers dedicated to the centenary celebration of the American Chemical Society Division of Polymeric Materials: Science and Engineering which has been the scientific home of many polymer scientists and engineers in the semiconductor industry. It is a review of parts of the research and development of advanced polymeric electronic materials for the fabrication and manufacturing of modern integrated circuits at the International Business Machines Corporation. This paper covers three types of advanced polymeric electronic materials: (1) photoresist materials used to “print” integrated circuits on silicon wafers, (2) on-chip low dielectric constant (low-κ) materials to insulate electrically conducting copper wires and (3) photo-patternable on-chip low-κ materials which function both as a photoresist and as an on-chip low-κ material. The photoresist materials are thin film imaging material systems of bilayer photoresist materials for 248 nm lithography and trilayer photoresist materials for 193 nm lithography. The low-κ dielectric material part focuses on fundamental understanding of plasma-induced damage to nanoporous organosilicate low-κ dielectric materials and the design of damage-resistant low-κ dielectric materials. Finally, the photo-patternable low-κ dielectric materials part describes the design and the development of dual-functional photo-patternable low-κ dielectric materials for both 193 nm and 248 nm lithography patterning of semiconductor Back-End-Of-the-Line. Several of these materials have been adopted for high-volume manufacturing of semiconductor chips for some of the most popular electronic devices in the world today.