The worldwide semiconductor community faces increasingly difficult challenges in the era of silicon nanotechnology and beyond. The magnitude of these challenges demands special attention from the metrology and analytical measurements community. New paradigms must be found. Adequate research and development for new metrology concepts are urgently needed. Characterization and metrology are key enablers for developing new semiconductor technology and in improving manufacturing. This book summarizes major issues and gives critical reviews of important measurement techniques that are crucial to continuing the advances in semiconductor technology. It covers major aspects of process technology and most characterization techniques for silicon research, including development, manufacturing, and diagnostics. The book also covers emerging nano-devices and the corresponding metrology challenges that arise.

The worldwide semiconductor community faces increasingly difficult challenges as it moves into the manufacturing of chips with feature sizes approaching 100 nm and beyond. The magnitude of these challenges demands special attention from the metrology and analytical measurements community. New paradigms must be found. Adequate research and development for new metrology concepts are urgently needed. Topics include: integrated circuit history, challenges and overviews, front end, lithography, interconnect and back end, and critical analytical techniques. Characterization and metrology are key enablers for developing new semiconductor technology and in improving manufacturing. This book summarizes major issues and gives critical reviews of important measurement techniques that are crucial to continue the advances in semiconductor technology. It covers major aspects of process technology and most characterization techniques for silicon research, including development, manufacturing, and diagnostics. The editors believe that this book of collected papers provides a concise and effective portrayal of industry characterization needs and the way they are being addressed by industry, academia, and government to continue the dramatic progress in semiconductor technology. Hopefully, it will also provide a basis for stimulating advances in metrology and new ideas for research and development.

This book surveys the major and newly developed techniques for semiconductor strain metrology. Semiconductor strain metrology has emerged in recent years as a topic of great interest to researchers involved in thin film and nanoscale device characterizati

ISTC/CSTIC is an annual semiconductor technology conference covering all the aspects of semiconductor technology and manufacturing, including devices, design, lithography, integration, materials, processes, manufacturing as well as emerging semiconductor technologies and silicon material applications. ISTC/CSTIC 2009 was merged by ISTC (International Semiconductor Technology Conference) and CSTIC (China Semiconductor Technology International Conference), the two industry leading technical conferences in China, and consisted of one plenary session and nine technical symposia. This issue of ECS Transactions contains 159 papers from the conference.

A one-stop, concise guide on determining and measuring thin film thickness by optical methods. This practical book covers the laws of electromagnetic radiation and interaction of light with matter, as well as the theory and practice of thickness measurement, and modern applications. In so doing, it shows the capabilities and opportunities of optical thickness determination and discusses the strengths and weaknesses of measurement devices along with their evaluation methods. Following an introduction to the topic, Chapter 2 presents the basics of the propagation of light and other electromagnetic radiation in space and matter. The main topic of this book, the determination of the thickness of a layer in a layer stack by measuring the spectral reflectance or transmittance, is treated in the following three chapters. The color of thin layers is discussed in chapter 6. Finally, in chapter 7, the author discusses several industrial applications of the layer thickness measurement, including high-reflection and anti-reflection coatings, photolithographic structuring of semiconductors, silicon on insulator, transparent conductive films, oxides and polymers, thin film photovoltaics, and heavily doped silicon. Aimed at industrial and academic researchers, engineers, developers and manufacturers involved in all areas of optical layer and thin optical film measurement and metrology, process control, real-time monitoring, and applications.