KR20070117734A - Chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

A chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment is disclosed. Such a chamber gas generator includes a canister having side walls, an upper space and a bottom space forming an inner space having an upper region and a lower region, an inlet port and an outlet port formed through the canister and communicating with the upper region; And a partition portion installed near the bottom of the canister and having a partition portion covering at least a portion of the bottom area of the canister so that the bubbling of the canister is dispersed throughout the canister, thereby increasing the carrier gas flow rate. There is an effect to increase the evaporation amount of the ALD or CVD source without. Therefore, there is an advantage of maximizing equipment efficiency and maximizing productivity.

Description

Process gas generating apparatus for use in semiconductor device fabrication equipment

1 is a structural diagram of a chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment according to the present invention

2 is a detailed structural diagram of a partition portion of FIG. 1

FIG. 3 is a graph illustrating canister deposition time compared to the prior art according to the result of using the apparatus of FIG. 1. FIG.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to semiconductor equipment, and more particularly, to a chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment for generating a process gas supplied to a process chamber.

Usually, in the installation which manufactures a semiconductor element, various kinds of reaction gas are used at the time of a semiconductor process progress. Most semiconductor devices form a precise device with a high degree of integration by stacking multilayer thin films with semiconductor, conductor, and insulator materials, and etching circuits to form circuit elements. Therefore, the process of forming a thin film with various materials in the manufacture of semiconductor devices is one of the most essential and the most common process.

There may be various methods of laminating such thin films, and among them, chemical vapor deposition (CVD), physical vapor deposition (PVD), atomic layer deposition (ALD), etc. are typical. to be. A particularly popular method is CVD or ALD technique, in which a wafer is placed in a confined space called a process chamber, and then a wafer is injected using materials generated by chemical reaction by injecting source gas contained in a plurality of canisters through an injector. An interlayer insulating film is formed on the film or the film quality formed on the wafer is planarized, and a silicon oxide film, a silicon nitride film, or the like is formed to achieve another object.

Integrated circuits, on the other hand, have evolved into complex devices that can include millions of transistors, capacitors, and resistors on a single chip. Advances in chip design continue to demand faster circuits and greater circuit densities that require fairly accurate manufacturing processes. Accurate processing of the substrate requires precise control of the temperature, fluid delivery rate and pressure used during processing. Control of these fluids is generally facilitated using gas panels that include various valves, regulators, flow controllers, and the like. The fluid used during processing is provided to a gas panel and the liquid or gas is formed from a central gas source or supply vessel located near the panel. Some process gases may be generated at or near the gas panel through a sublimation process from a solid material. Sublimation is generally a process in which a gas is produced directly from a solid at a certain pressure and temperature without passing through the liquid state. Certain gases that may be produced through the sublimation process include xenon difluoride, nickel carbonyl, tungsten hexa-carbonyl, and pentakis (dimethylamino) tantalum (PDMAT), among others. Because these materials are very active and expensive, careful control of the sublimation process is required to manage the generation of sublimed solids without undue consumption.

Conventional sublimation processes are generally performed in a heating vessel filled with a solid precursor material to be sublimed. When gas is required, the vessel wall and / or tray containing the solid precursor (precursor) material is heated to produce gas. Alternative gas generation processes include mixing a liquid with a solid or liquid precursor material. The carrier gas is then bubbled through the mixture to transport the generated process gas. However, when the carrier gas bubbles through or collides with the solid precursor or the liquid / solid mixture, the carrier gas from the solid precursor and / or liquid Particulates are included in the carrier gas and delivered into the process chamber. Liquid or solid particulates may be a source of chamber or substrate contamination. Therefore, the reduction of particulates passing from the precursor gas generator into the processing chamber will be performed for more than one purpose. First, the reduction of particulates will reduce substrate defects. Second, the reduction of particulates will reduce the downtime needed to clean the contaminated chamber surface. Therefore, what is needed is an improved method and apparatus for providing precursor gas to a processing chamber.

Therefore, in the case of ALD or CVD plants, bubbling systems are used as one of such process gas supplies. This injects the carrier gas into the canister containing the ALD or CVD source and sends the evaporated source into the chamber to form the metal or insulating films to be deposited. The thickness of the film thus formed depends on the amount of source to be evaporated and is made possible by increasing the amount of carrier gas to increase the amount of source. However, if the amount of carrier gas is continuously increased, the bubbling may be excessive, causing clogging, that is, clogging of the canister output pipe. Therefore, there is preferably a technique that can increase the amount of evaporation of an ALD or CVD source without increasing the carrier gas flow rate.

Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a semiconductor device manufacturing equipment that can solve the above problems.

It is another object of the present invention to provide an improved chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment that can contribute to the improvement of productivity in ALD or CVD processes.

Still another object of the present invention is to provide a chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment capable of increasing the amount of evaporation of an ALD or CVD source without increasing the carrier gas flow rate.

According to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention for achieving the above objects, the chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment, and the canister having a side wall, a top and a bottom forming an inner space having an upper region and a lower region; An inlet port and an outlet port formed through the canister and communicating with the upper region, and a circular shielding type near the bottom of the canister, and allowing the bubbling of the canister to be dispersed in the canister as a whole. It is characterized by comprising a partition portion for covering at least a portion of the bottom area of the.

Preferably, the source of bubbling is in the form of an ALD or CVD precursor, and the spacing between the sidewall of the canister and the circular partition is about 1/10 to 1/3 of the inner radius of the canister. Can be.

In addition, the bubbling gas may be one of argon, nitrogen, or helium gas, and the partition part may be fixedly installed at the bottom of the canister.

According to the apparatus configuration of the present invention described above, there is an effect of increasing the amount of evaporation of the ALD or CVD source while using the same carrier gas flow rate. Therefore, there is an advantage of maximizing equipment efficiency and maximizing productivity.

Hereinafter, a preferred embodiment of the structure of the chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. Although shown in different drawings, components that perform the same or similar functions are represented by the same reference numerals.

1 is a structural diagram of a chamber gas generator for a semiconductor device manufacturing apparatus according to the present invention. 2 is a detailed structural diagram of the partition portion in FIG. 1.

1 and 2 together, a canister 200 having sidewalls, an upper and a bottom, and an inner space having an upper region and a lower region, and formed through the canister 200 and formed in the upper region. And an inlet port 210 and an outlet port 211 in communication with the bottom of the canister 200, and are installed in a circular shielding film type so that the bubbling of the canister 200 is entirely dispersed in the canister 200. In order to cover the bottom region of the canister 200 to at least part of the partition portion 100 is configured to constitute the chamber gas generator for the semiconductor device manufacturing equipment.

Referring to FIG. 2, which shows a sphere of the partition portion 100, a circular shape is installed in the bottom region of the canister 200 to cover at least a portion of the bottom region so that the bubbling is dispersed in the canister 200 as a whole. The shielding film 110 is shown. The circular shielding film 110 has a connecting portion 116 in three parts to be fixedly installed in the bottom area.

In FIG. 1, canister 200 is comprised of a housing or other sealed container to hold a precursor (precursor material) from which process gas may be generated through a sublimation or vaporization process. Certain solid precursor materials that may generate process gas within canister 200 through a sublimation process include, among others, xenon difluoride, nickel carbonyl, tungsten hexa-carbonyl, and pentakis (dimethylamino) tantalum ( PDMAT). Certain liquid precursor materials that may generate process gas in canister 200 through a vaporization process include, among others, tetrakis (dimethylamino) titanium (TDMAT), tertbutyliminotris (diethylamino) tantalum (TBTDET). ), And pentacis (ethylmethylamino) tantalum (PEMAT). The housing of the canister 200 is made of a material that is substantially inert to the precursor material and the gas produced therefrom, and may be changed based on the gas produced as the constituent material. In one embodiment, when tungsten hexa-carbonyl is generated in canister 200, the canister housing is substantially in tungsten hexa-carbonyl, such as, for example, stainless steel, aluminum, PFA, or other suitable inorganic. It is made from an inert material.

The housing of the canister 200 may take a predetermined number of structural forms. In the embodiment shown in the figures, the housing includes a cylindrical side wall and a bottom sealed by a lid. The lid may be joined to the sidewall by welding, bonding, gluing, or other hermetic methods. Alternatively, the joints between the side walls and the lids may have seals, o-rings, gaskets, and the like disposed therebetween to prevent leakage from the canister 200. The sidewall may comprise, for example, a hollow square tube. Inlet port 210 and outlet port 211 are formed through the canister so that gas flows into and out of canister 200. The valves 206 and 207 are sealingly coupled to the baffle ports 202 and 203 to prevent leakage from the canister 200 when the canister 200 is removed for filling precursor material or replacing the canister 200. do. The canister 200 has an inner space having an upper region and a lower region. The lower region of canister 200 is at least partially filled with precursor material.

In one embodiment, the precursor material and the liquid are stirred by a magnetic stirrer, not shown. The magnetic stirrer includes a magnetic motor disposed below the bottom of the canister 200 and a magnetic fill disposed in the lower region of the canister 200. The magnetic motor operates to rotate the magnetic fill in the canister 200 to mix the slurry. The magnetic fill should have an outer coating material that does not react with the precursor material, liquid, or canister 200. Suitable magnetic mixers are commonly available.

The baffles 202 and 203 are disposed between the inlet port and the outlet port, creating an extended average flow path to prevent carrier gas from flowing directly from the inlet port to the outlet port (ie, straight line). This increases the time the carrier gas stays in the canister 200 and increases the amount of sublimed or vaporized precursor gas carried by the carrier gas. In this case, by installing the circular partition shown in Fig. 2, the effect of bubbling is dispersed to the entire area of the canister. In an exemplary mode of operation, the lower region of canister 200 is at least partially filled with a mixture of diffusion pump oil and tungsten hexa-carbonyl to form a slurry. The slurry is maintained at a pressure of about 5 Torr and heated to a temperature in the range of about 40 to about 50 ° C. by a resistive heater positioned proximate to canister 200. Argon-type carrier gas enters the upper region through the inlet port 210 at a flow rate of about 200 sccm. Argon flows through the baffle into the extended average flow path formed by the serpentine path before exiting the canister 200 through the exit port 211, thereby arranging the average residence time of argon in the upper region of the canister 200. Increase. Increased residence time in canister 200 increases the degree of saturation of tungsten hexa-carbonyl sublimed in the carrier gas. Moreover, the sinuous path through the baffle exposes substantially all of the exposed surface area of the precursor material to the carrier gas flow to uniformly consume the precursor material and generate the precursor gas.

As a result, in the present invention, it is indicated by the dotted line in the structure of the canister of FIG. 1 and has a structure in which the effect of bubbling is distributed to the entire area of the canister by providing a circular partition as shown in detail in FIG. Accordingly, the effect of bubbling can be increased even at the flow rate of the same carrier gas.

Preferably, the source of bubbling is in the form of an ALD or CVD precursor, and the spacing between the sidewall of the canister and the circular partition is about 1/10 to 1/3 of the inner radius of the canister 200. It can be formed as. In addition, the bubbling gas may be one of argon, nitrogen, or helium gas, and the partition part may be fixedly installed at the bottom of the canister.

FIG. 3 is a graph illustrating canister deposition time compared to the conventional method according to the result of using the apparatus of FIG. 1. In the figure, the horizontal axis shows the types of canisters, and the vertical axis shows the time taken for the deposition. The numbers shown on the right side of the figure indicate the thickness in units of Angstroms. Figure 3 shows, finally, a comparison of deposition times for film formation using a CVD Al precursor to test the efficiency of bubbling of the canister structure. As a result of confirming the difference in deposition according to the number of proceeds by installing the same equipment, as shown in FIG. 2, the film thickness is uniform, while the initial deposition time of the existing canister is about 6 to 11 of 34 seconds compared to 40 to 45 seconds. It was confirmed that the second improvement. In such a case, since the same film thickness can be obtained even with a shorter deposition time than the conventional canister, it is considered that the efficiency of the installation can be improved and the productivity can be maximized.

As described above, in the present invention, the process gas is generated by using the canister of the new structure, so that the amount of evaporation of the source is increased without increasing the flow rate of the carrier gas, thereby increasing the productivity of the ALD or CVD process.

In the above description, the embodiments of the present invention have been described with reference to the drawings, for example. However, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the present invention may be variously modified or changed within the scope of the technical idea of the present invention. . For example, of course, if the case is different, the shape of the partition portion or the installation position can be changed in various ways.

As described above, according to the present invention, there is an effect of increasing the amount of evaporation of the ALD or CVD source without increasing the carrier gas flow rate. Therefore, there is an advantage of maximizing equipment efficiency and maximizing productivity.

Claims (5)

In a chamber gas generator for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment: A canister with sidewalls, top and bottom forming an interior space having an upper region and a lower region; An inlet port and an outlet port formed through the canister and in communication with the upper region; And A chamber for semiconductor device manufacturing equipment installed in a circular shielding film type near the bottom of the canister and having a partition portion covering at least a portion of the bottom area of the canister so that the bubbling of the canister is dispersed throughout the canister. Gas generator. The chamber gas generator of claim 1, wherein the source of bubbling is in the form of an ALD or a CVD precursor. The chamber gas generator of claim 1, wherein an interval between the sidewall of the canister and the circular partition portion is formed in a size of 1/10 to 1/3 of an inner radius of the canister. The chamber gas generator of claim 1, wherein the bubbling gas is argon, nitrogen, or helium gas. The chamber gas generator of claim 1, wherein the partition part is fixedly installed at a bottom of the canister.

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