Modeling and simulation of chemically amplified electron beam, x-ray, and EUV resist processes

Abstract

With the shrinkage of feature sizes, ever precise accuracy has been required for process simulators because of the importance of nanoscale resist topography such as line edge roughness. Formation processes of latent images in chemically amplified electron beam (EB), x-ray, and EUV resists are different from both chemically amplified photoresists used in optical lithography and conventional, nonchemically amplified EB resists. A new simulation scheme precisely based on reaction mechanisms is necessary to reproduce resist patterns for the postoptical lithographies. We proposed a method to simulate electron dynamics in chemically amplified resists and to calculate the acid distribution around an ionization point with a typical parameter set.