GHz half wavelength contact acoustic microscopy (HaWaCAM): a feasibility study

B. A. J. Quesson; P. L. M. J. van Neer; M. S. Tamer; K. Hatakeyama; M. H. van Es; M. C. J. M. van Riel; D. Piras

doi:10.1117/12.2613753

26 May 2022 GHz half wavelength contact acoustic microscopy (HaWaCAM): a feasibility study

B. A. J. Quesson, P. L. M. J. van Neer, M. S. Tamer, K. Hatakeyama, M. H. van Es, M. C. J. M. van Riel, D. Piras

Proceedings Volume 12053, Metrology, Inspection, and Process Control XXXVI; 1205304 (2022) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2613753
Event: SPIE Advanced Lithography + Patterning, 2022, San Jose, California, United States

Abstract

The semiconductor industry needs to fit ever more devices per unit area to improve their performance; hence a trend towards increasingly complex structures by varying material combinations and 3D geometries with increasing aspect ratios. The new materials used may be optically opaque, posing problems for traditional optical metrology methods. One solution is to use acoustical waves, which present the double advantage of not being hampered by optically opaque layers and allowing for penetration depths of 10’s of μm at sub-μm wavelengths; which is considerably larger than most traditional optical methods (O(100 nm’s - μm’s)). Here, we present a novel acoustic metrology method using GHz ultrasound waves to measure deeply buried subsurface features (<5 μm). The concept consisted of a GHz acoustic transducer integrated above the tip of a custom designed probe, which is then scanned across a sample. The method uses non-damaging solid-solid contact without the need for liquid coupling layers – in contrast to conventional acoustical microscopy. This allows for the use of much higher acoustic frequencies, hence higher on-axis resolutions. The transducer is used in pulse-echo mode and a stage controller is used to move the probe for scanning. An experimental setup was built with a 4 GHz transducer and tested successfully on 1.5-2 μm size features buried below a 5 μm PMMA or 10 μm SiO2 layer, respectively. A good match was further obtained between the measurements and the model predictions. These results demonstrated the feasibility of the new method, opening new opportunities for metrology and inspection applications.

Citation Download Citation

B. A. J. Quesson, P. L. M. J. van Neer, M. S. Tamer, K. Hatakeyama, M. H. van Es, M. C. J. M. van Riel, and D. Piras "GHz half wavelength contact acoustic microscopy (HaWaCAM): a feasibility study", Proc. SPIE 12053, Metrology, Inspection, and Process Control XXXVI, 1205304 (26 May 2022); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2613753

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KEYWORDS

Acoustics

Transducers

Metrology

Polymethylmethacrylate

Microscopy

Interfaces

Silicon

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