SBIR/STTR Phase II: Gas-Cluster Ion Source for Mass Spectrometer and Microelectronic Applications

SBIR/STTR 第二阶段：用于质谱仪和微电子应用的气体团簇离子源

• 批准号: 0078580
• 负责人: David Fenner
• 金额: $ 40万
• 依托单位: EPION CORPORATION
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2000
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2000-09-15 至 2002-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0078580&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SBIR; STTR; Phase; II; Gas

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase II project will design, fabricate and test aprototype gas-cluster ion-beam (GCIB) sputtering tool for depth profiles withmonolayer-specific surface analysis of thin films. Applications will be to multilayerthin films of key importance in the microelectronics industries including semiconductors,metals in magnetic sensors, and dielectrics in photonic and micro-optical devices. Thesputtering tool is expected to meet aggressive performance specifications including depthresolution of less than 1 nm in conjunction with mass spectrometry. This GCIB tool willbe designed particularly for in-situ sputtering with surface-analytical instrumentsincluding the secondary-ion mass spectrometer (SIMS), the Auger electron spectrometer(AES) and the x-ray photoelectron spectrometer (XPS). The overriding motivation is thecritical need in microelectronics for techniques to obtain accurate sputter depthmeasurements. The Phase-I effort demonstrated those GCIB methods with argon clusterssputter with near-atomic smoothness, high depth resolution and high secondary-ion yields.Minor instrumental design issues limited the cluster beam exposure uniformity and thisartificially limited the average depth resolution measured. Straightforward engineeringsolutions are well known and are expected to yield improvements in Phase II that willprovide depth resolution of well below 1 nm.The proposed technology will enable analysis of next-generation microelectronics deviceshaving much thinner films. Epion is the first and only to manufacture GCIB systems. Thetool to be prototyped will enable and have a wide applicability to many areas of theelectronic materials processing and manufacturing industry.

这个小型企业创新研究第二阶段项目将设计、制造和测试一种原型气体团簇离子束(GCIB)溅射工具，用于单层薄膜比表面分析的深度分布。应用领域包括半导体、磁性传感器中的金属以及光子和微光器件中的电介质等微电子工业中至关重要的多层薄膜。该溅射工具预计将满足激进的性能规格，包括深度分辨率低于1纳米，并结合质谱学。这种GCIB工具将专门为原位溅射而设计，表面分析仪器包括二次离子质谱仪(SIMS)、俄歇电子能谱仪(AES)和X射线光电子能谱仪(XPS)。压倒一切的动机是微电子学对获得准确溅射深度测量技术的关键需求。第一阶段的工作表明，利用Ar团簇溅射的GCIB方法具有近原子光滑度、高深度分辨率和高二次离子产额。较小的仪器设计问题限制了团簇光束曝光的均匀性，这人为地限制了测量的平均深度分辨率。直截了当的工程解决方案是众所周知的，预计在第二阶段将产生改进，提供远低于1纳米的深度分辨率。拟议的技术将使具有更薄薄膜的下一代微电子设备的分析成为可能。Epion是第一个也是唯一一个制造GCIB系统的公司。该原型将使电子材料加工和制造行业的许多领域具有广泛的适用性。