Influence of base and photoacid generator on deprotection blur in extreme ultraviolet photoresists and some thoughts on shot noise

A contact-hole deprotection blur metric has been used to monitor the deprotection blur of an experimental open platform resist (EH27) as the wt % of base and photoacid generator (PAG) were varied. A six times increase in base wt % is shown to reduce the size of successfully patterned 1:1 line-space features from 52to39nm without changing deprotection blur. Corresponding isolated line edge roughness is reduced from 6.9to4.1nm. A two times increase in PAG wt % is shown to improve 1:1 line-space patterning from 47to40nm without changing deprotection blur or isolated line edge roughness. A discussion of improved patterning performance as related to shot noise and deprotection blur concludes with a speculation that the spatial distribution of PAG molecules has been playing some role, perhaps a dominant one, in determining the uniformity of photogenerated acids in the resists that have been studied.A contact-hole deprotection blur metric has been used to monitor the deprotection blur of an experimental open platform resist (EH27) as the wt % of base and photoacid generator (PAG) were varied. A six times increase in base wt % is shown to reduce the size of successfully patterned 1:1 line-space features from 52to39nm without changing deprotection blur. Corresponding isolated line edge roughness is reduced from 6.9to4.1nm. A two times increase in PAG wt % is shown to improve 1:1 line-space patterning from 47to40nm without changing deprotection blur or isolated line edge roughness. A discussion of improved patterning performance as related to shot noise and deprotection blur concludes with a speculation that the spatial distribution of PAG molecules has been playing some role, perhaps a dominant one, in determining the uniformity of photogenerated acids in the resists that have been studied.

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