Method for forming semiconductor device including a dual inlaid structure

• US 6,130,102 A
• Filed: 11/03/1997
• Issued: 10/10/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 11/03/1997
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: North Star Innovations Inc. (Wi-LAN Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Motorola, Inc. (Motorola Solutions, Inc.)
• Inventors: White, Jr., Bruce E., Jones, Jr., Robert Edwin
• Primary Examiner(s): TSAI, H JEY
• Application Number:
  US08/963,443
• Time in Patent Office: 1,072 Days
• Field of Search: 438/3, 438/240, 438/253-256, 438/393-398, 257/295
• US Class Current: 438/3
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 21/76807 for dual damascene structures
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 21/76895 Local interconnects; Local pads, as exemplified by patent document EP0896365
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 28/55 with a dielectric comprising a perovskite structure material
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 28/60 Electrodes
• CPC Class Codes: H10B 12/033 the capacitor extending over the transistor
• CPC Class Codes: H10B 12/05 Making the transistor

Abstract

A method for forming an improved embedded DRAM structure, that is formed on-chip with CMOS logic portions, begins by forming dual inlaid regions (34a through 34c). The region (34a) is a portion of a dual inlaid region which is filled with an oxidation tolerant material (e.g., iridium or ruthenium) to form a metallic plug (36a). This plug (36a) forms a storage node region for a DRAM and electrically contacts to a current electrode (26) of a DRAM pass transistor. Opening (34b) is filled concurrently with the filling of opening (34a), to form a metallic plug (36b) which forms a bit line contact for the DRAM cell. A top portion of the dual inlaid structure (34c) is filled concurrent with regions (34a and 34b) to enable formation of a bottom electrode of the ferroelectric DRAM capacitor. Since the geometry of the region (36c) is defined by dual inlaid/CMP processing, no RIE-defined sidewall of the bottom capacitor electrode is present whereby capacitor leakage current is reduced. Furthermore, the oxygen-tolerant material used to form the plugs (36a through 36c) herein prevents adverse plug oxidation which is present in the prior art during ferroelectric oxygen annealing.

Claims

1. A method for forming a semiconductor device structure comprising the steps of:

providing a semiconductor substrate;

forming a dielectric region over the semiconductor substrate;

forming a dual inlaid opening in the dielectric region, wherein;

the dual inlaid opening having an upper region having a first width between first substantially parallel first sidewall portions of the dual inlaid opening;

a lower region having a second width between second substantially parallel second sidewall portions of the dual inlaid opening; and

the upper region is significantly wider than the lower region; and

filling at least a portion of the dual inlaid opening with an oxygen-tolerant metal to form an inlaid portion having a top inlaid portion and a bottom inlaid portion.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of:

forming a capacitor dielectric over the top inlaid portion, wherein the top inlaid portion forms a first capacitor electrode; and

forming a second capacitor electrode over the capacitor dielectric.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the bottom inlaid portion is electrically connected to a portion of the semiconductor substrate to form a contact portion.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the step of forming a capacitor dielectric further comprises:

forming a capacitor dielectric wherein the capacitor dielectric is a high permitivity dielectric (high-k dielectric).

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the step of forming a capacitor dielectric further comprises:

forming a capacitor dielectric wherein the high permitivity dielectric comprises a ferroelectric material.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the step of forming a capacitor dielectric further comprises:

forming a capacitor dielectric wherein the capacitor dielectric comprises a titanium oxide compound (TiO_x).

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the step of forming a capacitor dielectric further comprises:

forming a capacitor dielectric wherein the capacitor dielectric is selected from the group of barium titanate and strontium titanate (SrTiO₃).

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the bottom inlaid portion is substantially in direct contact with the semiconductor substrate.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the bottom inlaid portion is substantially in direct contact with a conductive plug, wherein the conductive plug is in electrically connected with the semiconductor substrate.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the step of filling further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening, wherein the conductive plug is tungsten.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the bottom inlaid portion is electrically coupled to a portion of the semiconductor substrate.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises iridium (Ir).

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises ruthenium (Ru).

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises osmium (Os).

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises Platinum (Pt).

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises Paladium (Pd).

17. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling the dual inlaid opening further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises rhenium (Re).

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening to form an inlaid portion wherein the inlaid portion comprises a portion of a storage node of a memory.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling further comprises the substeps of:

filling a first portion of the dual inlaid opening with a first conductive material; and

filling a second portion of the dual inlaid opening with the oxygen-tolerant metal.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the step of filling a first portion further comprises:

filling the first portion of the dual inlaid opening with a first conductive material that is different than the oxygen-tolerant metal.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the step of filling a first portion further comprises:

filling the first portion of the dual inlaid opening with a first conductive material that is an oxygen intolerant material.

30. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of filling includes:

simultaneously filling at least a portion of the dual inlaid opening with an oxygen-tolerant metal to form an inlaid portion having a top inlaid portion and a bottom inlaid portion.

22. A method of forming a memory cell comprising the steps of:

providing a semiconductor substrate;

forming a transistor on the semiconductor substrate, the transistor having a first current electrode, a second current electrode, and a gate;

forming a bit line coupled to the first current electrode;

forming a word line coupled to the gate;

forming a dual inlaid opening over the second current electrode;

filling the dual inlaid opening with an oxygen-tolerant metal to form a first capacitor electrode at a top portion of the dual inlaid opening and a storage node portion at a bottom portion of the dual inlaid opening, the bottom portion being electrically coupled to the second current electrode;

forming a dielectric region over the first capacitor electrode; and

forming a second capacitor electrode over the dielectric region.

23. The method of claim 22 wherein the step of filling further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening wherein the oxygen-tolerant metal comprises iridium (Ir).

24. The method of claim 22 wherein the step of forming a dielectric region further comprises:

forming a dielectric region wherein dielectric region comprises a high permitivity dielectric.

25. The method of claim 22, further comprising the steps of:

forming an interlevel dielectric region over the semiconductor substrate;

forming a first opening in the interlevel dielectric region over the second current electrode; and

filling the first opening with a conductive material to form a bottom portion of a storage node, wherein the bottom portion of the storage node is electrically coupled to the second current electrode and is formed prior to the step of forming the dual inlaid opening.

26. The method of claim 22, wherein the step of filling further comprises:

filling the dual inlaid opening, wherein the first capacitor electrode contacts the second current electrode.

27. The method of claim 22, wherein the method of forming a memory cell includes forming a Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM) cell as the memory cell.

28. The method of claim 22, wherein the method of forming a memory cell includes forming a ferroelectric nonvolatile memory bit cell as the memory cell.

31. The method of claim 22, wherein the step of filling includes:

filling the dual inlaid opening with the oxygen-tolerant metal to form the first capacitor electrode at the top portion of the dual inlaid opening, wherein the first capacitor electrode is formed substantially entirely within the dual inlaid opening.

32. The method of claim 22, wherein the step of forming a dielectric region includes:

forming the dielectric region in direct contact with the first capacitor electrode.

29. A method of forming a semiconductor structure, the method comprising the steps of:

providing a semiconductor substrate;

forming a memory cell transistor on the semiconductor substrate, the memory cell transistor having a first current electrode, a second current electrode, and a gate;

forming a logic gate transistor on the semiconductor substrate, the logic gate transistor having a first current electrode, a second current electrode, and a gate;

forming a bit line coupled to the first current electrode of the memory cell transistor;

forming a word line coupled to the gate of the memory cell transistor;

forming a dual inlaid opening over the second current electrode of the memory cell transistor;

forming an inlaid opening over the second current electrode of the logic gate transistor;

filling the dual inlaid opening and the inlaid opening with an oxygen-tolerant metal to form a first capacitor electrode electrically coupled to the second current electrode of the memory cell transistor and to form a contact plug electrically coupled to the second current electrode of the logic gate transistor;

forming a dielectric region over the first capacitor electrode; and

forming a second capacitor electrode over the dielectric region.