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The performance of chemically amplified resist is approaching its physical limit with the reduction of feature sizes due to the acid diffusion needed for the solubility change of resist polymer. The line edge roughness (LER) of chemically amplified resists rapidly increases in the sub-10-nm-half-pitch region when the half-pitch is decreased. Also, the stochastic defect (pinching and bridges) generation is a significant concern for the high resolution patterning with high throughput. To solve these problems, the increase of the density of resist films is an important strategy. Metal oxide nanoparticle resists have attracted much attention as the next generation resist used for the high-volume production of semiconductor devices because of their high density property. However, the sensitization mechanism of the metal oxide nanoparticle resists is unknown. Understanding the sensitization mechanism is important for the efficient development of resist materials. In this study, the sensitization mechanism of ZrO2 nanoparticle resist was investigated. The numbers of electron-hole pairs required for the solubility change of the resist films were estimated for a ZrO2 nanoparticle and a ligand shell, respectively. The radiation chemistry of ligands was investigated using a pulse radiolysis method. The pulse radiolysis is a powerful method to directly observe the kinetics of short-lived intermediate produced by an ionizing radiation. In the material design of metal oxide nanoparticle resists, it is important to efficiently use the electron-hole pairs generated in nanoparticles for the chemical change of ligand molecules.
Acknowledgement
This work was partially supported by Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).
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