Lam Research Corporation

Richard Yen-chang Yang

Michael S Barnes

Brian K McMillin

Tom Ni

Vikram Singh

Kenlin Chenjin Huang

A plasma processing system and method for processing substrates such as by chemical vapor deposition or etching. The system includes a plasma processing chamber, a substrate support for supporting a substrate within the processing chamber, a dielectric member having an interior surface facing the substrate support, the dielectric member forming a wall of the processing chamber, a primary gas supply supplying a primary gas such as process gas into the chamber, a secondary gas supply supplying a secondary gas such as a substantially inert, a substrate passivating or a reactant scavenging gas into the chamber, and an RF energy source such as a planar coil which inductively couples RF energy through the dielectric member and into the chamber to energize the primary gas into a plasma state. The secondary gas is concentrated near the periphery of the substrate, improving etching/deposition uniformity across the substrate surface.

Method and apparatus for improving etch and deposition uniformity in

A method for etching through a selected portion of a metallization layer of a wafer's layer stack in a high density plasma processing chamber includes performing a main etch by etching at least partially through the metallization layer of the layer stack with a main-etch etchant source gas that includes essentially Cl.sub.2 and BCl.sub.3 having a first Cl.sub.2 :BCl.sub.3 flow ratio. Thereafter, an over etch is performed by etching to a layer underlying the metallization layer with an over-etch etchant source gas that includes essentially Cl.sub.2 and BCl.sub.3 having a second Cl.sub.2 :BCl.sub.3 flow ratio that is higher than the first Cl.sub.2 :BCl.sub.3 flow ratio. The method may further include the step of performing a barrier layer etching step for etching a barrier layer of the layer stack prior to performing the over etch.

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Fremont, CA, United States of America

Richard Yen-chang Yang