The Effect of nitrogen partial pressure on Zr–Si–N diffusion barrier

✍ Scribed by Z.X Song; K.W Xu; H Chen

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2004
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 393 KB
• Volume: 71
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0167-9317
• DOI: 10.1016/j.mee.2003.08.006

✦ Synopsis

The Zr-Si-N diffusion barrier was sputtered on Si wafer with different nitrogen partial pressures by RF reactive magnetron sputtering. The Cu film was subsequently sputtered on Zr-Si-N by DC pulse magnetron sputtering. The results reveal that the Si content and resistivity of Zr-Si-N films increase with the increase of nitrogen partial pressure. There are more Si 3 N 4 crystallites when the Zr-Si-N films are sputtered with high nitrogen partial pressure. The (111) texture of Cu films becomes strong when the Cu films are on the Zr-Si-N films that are sputtered with high nitrogen partial pressure. The thermal stability of Zr-Si-N diffusion barrier becomes good and the number of void in Cu films becomes smaller as the nitrogen partial pressure increases. The Zr-Si-N film is considered an effective diffusion barrier for potential application in ULSI.