Photoactive Polymers Applied to Advanced Microelectronic Devices

Abstract

This paper describes recent results of research on organic materials, especially organic photopolymers for opto-electronic devices, which are contributing to the realization of the “Multimedia World” in the 21st century. For this purpose two photoactive polymers were developed for Gbit-scale dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip fabrication and for liquid crystal displays, respectively. For 1 Gbit DRAM fabrication mask, a novel and positive resist of the chemically amplified type was developed for ArF excimer laser lithography. It consists of new organic materials; an alicyclic methacrylate terpolymer and a photoacid generator called NEALS. A 0.20 μm line-and-space pattern was formed using an ArF excimer laser exposure system (numerical aperture of 0.55) and an aqueous base developer. For a bright and low-energy consumption display, a new polymer (poly(diacryloyloxy diethylstilbene)) was developed for a polymer stabilized cholesteric textures film, which operates without a polarizer. The film with a chlorine liquid crystal mixture shows good electro-optic properties, such as low driving voltage (V10 of 9.2 V), large charge holding ratio (92%), low width of hysteresis (0.4 V) and contrast ratio of 20, which demonstrate its potential for use in a display driven by a thin film transistor.