Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Comp. Ltd.

Kuo-Hao Lee

Jui-Chun Weng

Hsi-Cheng Hsu

Han-Zong Pan

You-Cheng Jhang

Hsin-Yu Chen

Chia-Chun Hung

Ji-Hong Chiang

Ching-Hsiang Hu

Chia-Yu Lin

Sheng-Yuan Lin

Chiu-Hua Chung

Hsin-yu Chen

Yu-Pei Chiang

Lavanya Sanagavarapu

Jia-Syuan Li

Yen-Chieh Tu

Chien-Tai Su

Alignment of devices formed on substrates that are to be bonded may be achieved through the use of scribe lines between the devices, where the scribe lines progressively increase or decrease in size from a center to an edge of one or more of the substrates to compensate for differences in the thermal expansion rates of the substrates. The devices on the substrates are brought into alignment as the substrates are heated during a bonding operation due to the progressively increased or decreased sizes of the scribe lines. The scribe lines may be arranged in a single direction in a substrate to compensate for thermal expansion along a single axis of the substrate or may be arranged in a plurality of directions to compensate for actinomorphic thermal expansion.

Wafer bonding alignment

A portion of a buffer layer on a backside of a substrate of a photomask assembly may be removed prior to formation of one or more capping layers on the backside of the substrate. The one or more capping layers may be formed directly on the backside of the substrate where the buffer layer is removed from the substrate, and a hard mask layer may be formed directly on the one or more capping layers. The one or more capping layers may include a low-stress material to promote adhesion between the one or more capping layers and the substrate, and to reduce and/or minimize peeling and delamination of the capping layer(s) from the substrate. This may reduce the likelihood of damage to the pellicle layer and/or other components of the photomask assembly and/or may increase the yield of an exposure process in which the photomask assembly is used.

Photomask assembly and method of forming the same

A photomask assembly may be formed such that stress relief trenches are formed in a pellicle frame of the photomask assembly. The stress relief trenches may reduce or prevent damage to a pellicle that may otherwise result from deformation of the pellicle. The stress relief trenches may be formed in areas of the pellicle frame to allow the pellicle frame to deform with the pellicle, thereby reducing the amount damage to the pellicle caused by the pellicle frame.

Pellicle frame with stress relief trenches

A micro-electromechanical-system (MEMS) device may be formed to include an anti-stiction polysilicon layer on one or more moveable MEMS structures of a device wafer of the MEMS device to reduce, minimize, and/or eliminate stiction between the moveable MEMS structures and other components or structures of the MEMS device. The anti-stiction polysilicon layer may be formed such that a surface roughness of the anti-stiction polysilicon layer is greater than the surface roughness of a bonding polysilicon layer on the surfaces of the device wafer that are to be bonded to a circuitry wafer of the MEMS device. The higher surface roughness of the anti-stiction polysilicon layer may reduce the surface area of the bottom of the moveable MEMS structures, which may reduce the likelihood that the one or more moveable MEMS structures will become stuck to the other components or structures.

Roughness selectivity for MEMS movement stiction reduction

Growing community of inventors

Hsinchu, Taiwan

Kuo-Hao Lee