Paul W. Mertens, Guy Vereecke & Rita Vos, IMEC, Leuven, Belgium

ABSTRACT

Removal of photoresist (PR) and residues is becoming very critical in future generations of devices.  In front-end-of-line (FEOL) post ion implantation (source/drain, extensions, halos, deep wells), the use of PR to block off parts of the circuit results in PR which is substantially hardened and difficult to remove.  In back-end-of-line (BEOL) etching, the selectivity to removing resist and residues without removing low-k materials is very challenging.  An overview of the status, issues and some novel approaches are presented.