Investigating EUV Radiation Chemistry with First Principle Quantum Chemistry Calculations

摘要

In Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) lithography, chemistry is driven by secondary electrons. A deeper understanding of theseprocesses is vital to targeted engineering of materials. As electron interactions are non-discriminative, studying theseprocesses directly in condensed phase with experiments is extremely challenging. Proxy experiments such as gas phaseexperiments and solution phase experiments are only viable to a limited subset of materials, limiting their use for largescale material screening. First principles quantum chemistry calculations have been adopted by various industries formaterials development and investigation. We demonstrate that such calculations can be used to model processes involvedin EUV radiation chemistry. We can reproduce experimental results and predict dose to clear with such calculations. Inthis article, we first demonstrate that primary electron energy spectrum can be predicted accurately. Secondly, thedynamics of a photoacid generator (PAG) upon excitation or electron attachment is studied with ab-initio moleculardynamics calculations. Thirdly, we demonstrate that electron attachment affinity is a good predictor of reduction potentialand dose to clear.