公开(公告)号：US20170243754A1

公开(公告)日：2017-08-24

申请号：US15398011

申请日：2017-01-04

Applicant: Applied Materials, Inc.

Inventor： Aurelien TAVERNIER ,  Qingjun ZHOU ,  Tom CHOI ,  Yungchen LIN ,  Ying ZHANG ,  Olivier JOUBERT

IPC: H01L21/311 ,  H01L21/3105 ,  H01L21/8234 ,  H01L21/3115

CPC classification number: H01L21/31116 ,  H01L21/0337 ,  H01L21/3105 ,  H01L21/31155 ,  H01L21/823431

Abstract: Embodiments described herein relate to methods for etching a substrate. Patterning processes, such as double patterning and quadruple patterning processes, may benefit from the embodiments described herein which include performing an inert plasma treatment to implant ions into a spacer material, performing an etching process on an implanted region of the spacer material, and repeating the inert plasma treatment and the etching process to form a predominantly flat top spacer profile. The inert plasma treatment process may be a biased process and the etching process may be an unbiased process. Various processing parameters, such as pressure, may be controlled to influence a desired spacer profile.