island growth as a growth mode in ALD作为ALD生长模式的岛屿生长.pdfVIP

JOURNAL OF APPLIED PHYSICS VOLUME 96, NUMBER 12 15 DECEMBER 2004 Island growth as a growth mode in atomic layer deposition: A phenomenological model Riikka L. Puurunena and Wilfried Vandervorst Interuniversity Microelectronics Center (IMEC vzw), Kapeldreef 75, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium and Integrated Systems (INSYS), University of Leuven (K.U.Leuven), Kasteelpark Arenberg, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium Received 12 April 2004; accepted 8 September 2004 Atomic layer deposition ALD has recently gained world-wide attention because of its suitability for the fabrication of conformal material layers with thickness in the nanometer range. Although the principles of ALD were realized about 40 years ago, the description of many physicochemical processes that occur during ALD growth is still under development. A constant amount of material deposited in an ALD reaction cycle, that is, growth-per-cycle GPC, has been a paradigm in ALD through decades. The GPC may vary, however, especially in the beginning of the ALD growth. In this work, a division of ALD processes to four classes is proposed, on the basis of how the GPC varies with the number of ALD reaction cycles: linear growth, substrate-enhanced growth, and substrate-inhibited growth of type 1 and type 2. Island growth is identified as a likely origin for type 2 substrate-inhibited growth, where the GPC increases and goes through a maximum before it settles to a constant value characteristic of a steady growth. A simple phenomenological model is developed to describe island growth in ALD. The model assumes that the substrate is unreactive with the ALD reactants, except for reactive defects.