Nonhalogen Dry Etching of Metal Carbide TiAlC by Low-Pressure N₂/H₂ Plasma at Room Temperature.

ABSTRACT: Ternary metal carbide TiAlC has been proposed as a metal gate material in logic semiconductor devices. It is a hard-to-etch material due to the low volatility of the etch byproducts. Here, a simple, highly controllable, and dry etching method for TiAlC has been first presented using nonhalogen N₂/H₂ plasmas at low pressure (several Pa) and 20 °C. A capacitively coupled plasma etcher was used to generate N₂/H₂ plasmas containing active species, such as N, NH, and H to modify the metal carbide surface. The etch rate of TiAlC was obtained at 3 nm/min by using the N₂/H₂ plasma, whereas no etching occurred with pure N₂ plasma or pure H₂ plasma under the same conditions. The surface roughness of the TiAlC fil

SUBMITTER: Nguyen TT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11450688 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature