Electromagnet array in a sputter reactor
First Claim
1. In a plasma sputter reactor having a substrate support disposed in a plane perpendicular to an axis of a vacuum chamber having sidewalls formed around the axis and a sputter target arranged in opposition to the substrate support across a space along the axis, an electromagnet array of at least three separately controllable electromagnet coils arranged at axial positions relative to the axis between the sputter target and the substrate support and all being configured to be connected to at least one DC power supply,wherein three electromagnet coils of the at least three electromagnet coil are arranged about the axis in a triangular array, andwherein at least two of the three electromagnet coils are disposed at different radii from the axis and at least two of the three electromagnet coils are disposed at different axial positions relative to the axis.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A multi-step process performed in a plasma sputter chamber including sputter deposition from the target and argon sputter etching of the substrate. The chamber includes a quadruple electromagnetic coil array coaxially arranged in a rectangular array about a chamber axis outside the sidewalls of a plasma sputter reactor in back of an RF coil within the chamber. The coil currents can be separately controlled to produce different magnetic field distributions, for example, between a sputter deposition mode in which the sputter target is powered to sputter target material onto a wafer and a sputter etch mode in which the RF coil supports the argon sputtering plasma. A TaN/Ta barrier is first sputter deposited with high target power and wafer bias. Argon etching is performed with even higher wafer bias. A flash step is applied with reduced target power and wafer bias.
41 Citations
10 Claims
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1. In a plasma sputter reactor having a substrate support disposed in a plane perpendicular to an axis of a vacuum chamber having sidewalls formed around the axis and a sputter target arranged in opposition to the substrate support across a space along the axis, an electromagnet array of at least three separately controllable electromagnet coils arranged at axial positions relative to the axis between the sputter target and the substrate support and all being configured to be connected to at least one DC power supply,
wherein three electromagnet coils of the at least three electromagnet coil are arranged about the axis in a triangular array, and wherein at least two of the three electromagnet coils are disposed at different radii from the axis and at least two of the three electromagnet coils are disposed at different axial positions relative to the axis.
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7. A plasma sputter reactor, comprising:
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a chamber body arranged about an axis; a support for supporting within said reactor a substrate to be plasma processed on a front face thereof; a sputtering target in opposition to the support along the axis and an array of a plurality of electromagnet coils arranged about said chamber body, wherein three of the electromagnet coils are arranged in a triangular array, at least some of the three electromagnet coils being independently powerable.
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9. A method of operating a plasma sputter reactor having a substrate support disposed in a plane perpendicular to an axis of a vacuum chamber having sidewalls formed around the axis and a sputter target arranged in opposition to the substrate support across a space along the axis, an electromagnet array comprising a plurality of electromagnet coils including three separately controllable electromagnet coils arranged in a triangular array about the axis at a plurality of axial positions relative to the axis between the sputter target and three substrate support and at a plurality of axial positions relative to the axis between the sputter target and the substrate support and at a plurality of radii from the axis and all of the three electromagnet coils being configured to be connected to at least one DC power supply, comprising the steps of:
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a first process step of generating a first plasma in the reactor while a substrate disposed on the substrate support including passing co-rotating currents through two of the three electromagnet coils; and a second process step of generating a second plasma in the reactor while the substrate is disposed on the substrate support including passing anti-rotating currents through the two electromagnet coils. - View Dependent Claims (10)
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Specification