Fundamental Properties of Fluoroalcohol-Methacrylate Polymers for use in 193nm Lithography

The fundamental properties of a series of hexafluoroalcohol-bearing methacrylate polymers (HFA-MA) are reported here. The material behavior is heavily influenced by the linking group between the methacrylate ester (or polymer backbone) and the hexafluoroalcohol (HFA) group. These materials form the basis for a variety of positive and negative resists, as well as immersion topcoats. Detailed structure/property relationships of these homopolymers and copolymers will be discussed. Finally, polymer blending results of dissimilar homopolymers are compared with copolymers of the same composition.