Postdoctoral Researcher Sequential Infiltration Synthesis (SIS) for Advanced Lithography

Over the past decades Optical Lithography has become increasingly complex and expensive. This is partly caused by the increasing importance of the interaction of the lithography process with other process steps in the patterning process (such as etching and deposition). At imec, patterning approaches for future device fabrication are explored and novel approaches are investigated to make the patterning process more robust and cost-effective. The patterning options that are mainly explored include Extreme Ultra Violet (EUV) lithography, 193nm immersion-based multiple patterning and directed self-assembly (DSA) of block co-polymers (BCP). The current opening is related to the research on EUV and DSA. A general issue with these technologies is in the limited etch resistance for pattern transfer of the high resolution polymeric patterning materials (photoresists and BCPs). Recently a novel process technique has been reported termed sequential infiltration synthesis (SIS) which may improve the etch resistance of the patterning materials after the patterning process. In SIS a volatile metal precursor is allowed to diffuse into the nano-structured organic polymer matrix. In a subsequent oxidation step a metal oxide is formed and the process may be repeated a number of times until the metal content in the polymer film increases the etch resistance to the desired level. In the case of BCP materials this process can be tuned to be selective to one of the blocks allowing for a selective functionalization. The goal of the project is to investigate the mechanisms that play a role in this SIS process. This will be explored for a selection of metal precursors and polymer materials. The purpose is to define in this way the boundary conditions for a robust SIS process. Your main activities: - setting up a process flow for implementation of SIS, based on an existing DSA flow. - exploration of the impact of other materials based on this baseline process. - building up a detailed understanding of the mechanisms that play a role in the SIS process by using analytical techniques including FT-IR and mass spectrometry. - setting up experiments, running them in our clean room or through simulation and analyzing the acquired data. - interaction with the material and equipment suppliers.