Investigation of multiphase printing writing modes on mask performance in MEBES 4500

摘要

Abstract: Multiphase printing (MPP$+TM$/) has been shown to improve registration and CD performance by reducing butting errors, averaging scan linearity errors and improving stripe boundary CD performance. In the MEBES 4500, improvements in the data path allow MPP to be used with a tolerable increase in write time making it an attractive option. A major concern is determining if MPP printing requires modification of subsequent mask processing steps. The use of larger spot sizes and multiple voting in MPP printing may alter CD performance during mask processing. Additionally, the multipass strategy inherent to MPP could result in a different CD signature due to time based effects. A further concern is to determine if MPP CD's impact pattern fidelity since this will affect inspectibility and wafer performance. Several experiments were conducted to determine how well MPP integrates with processing, how it is impacted by temporal averaging of errors and if it significantly alters pattern fidelity. A range of input addresses and different resist systems were investigated.!5