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:
Mar. 23, 2010
Filed:
Nov. 06, 2006
Paul MA, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Kavita Shah, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Dien-yeh Wu, San Jose, CA (US);
Seshadri Ganguli, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Christophe Marcadal, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Frederick C. Wu, Cupertino, CA (US);
Schubert S. Chu, San Francisco, CA (US);
Paul Ma, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Kavita Shah, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Dien-Yeh Wu, San Jose, CA (US);
Seshadri Ganguli, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Christophe Marcadal, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Frederick C. Wu, Cupertino, CA (US);
Schubert S. Chu, San Francisco, CA (US);
Applied Materials, Inc., Santa Clara, CA (US);
Abstract
Embodiments of the invention provide a method for forming a material on a substrate during an atomic layer deposition (ALD) process, such as a plasma-enhanced ALD (PE-ALD) process. In one embodiment, a method is provided which includes flowing at least one process gas through at least one conduit to form a circular gas flow pattern, exposing a substrate to the circular gas flow pattern, sequentially pulsing at least one chemical precursor into the process gas and igniting a plasma from the process gas to deposit a material on the substrate. In one example, the circular gas flow pattern has circular geometry of a vortex, a helix, a spiral, or a derivative thereof. Materials that may be deposited by the method include ruthenium, tantalum, tantalum nitride, tungsten or tungsten nitride. Other embodiments of the invention provide an apparatus configured to form the material during the PE-ALD process.