The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 09, 2003
Filed:
Sep. 14, 2001
Hsing Ti Tuan, Cupertino, CA (US);
Li-Chun Li, Los Gatos, CA (US);
Thomas Tong-Long Chang, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Mosel Vitelic, Inc., Hsin Chu, TW;
Abstract
In a nonvolatile memory, select gates are self-aligned spacers formed on sidewalls of floating/control gate stacks. The same mask ( ) is used to remove the select gate layer from over the source lines ( ), to etch trench insulation in the source line regions, and to dope the source lines. The memory can be formed in and over an isolated substrate region. The source lines can be doped at least partially before the trench insulation is etched, to prevent a short before the source lines and a region isolating the isolated substrate region from below. The memory can be erased by sectors, or alternatively a chip erase operation can be performed to erase all the cells in parallel. Peripheral transistor gates can be formed from the same layer as the select gates. The select gate spacers have extensions to which low resistance contacts can be made from overlying metal lines.