Evaluation of Single Semiconductor Defects Using Multiple Microanalysis Techniques

New analytical techniques are being employed to meet the stringent requirements for controlling defects in semiconductor manufacturing. While SEM/EDX continues to be an effective tool for root-cause analysis of particles and defects on the wafer surface, increasingly it is necessary to employ multiple techniques in analysis of a single defect to obtain sufficient information to resolve the problem. Until recently, this approach was impractical because the defects were too difficult to locate in standard analytical tools, especially on unpatterned wafers. But with the newly developed Mark-Assisted Defect Analysis (MADA) technique, the positioning problem has been eliminated, and it is a simple matter to employ multiple techniques on the same defect. In this paper we present results for defects analyzed by SEM/EDX, TOFSIMS, μ-ESCA, and AUGER, highlighting how these techniques compliment each other. Particular emphasis is given to the issue of the analytical technique changing the sample chemistry and influencing the results of subsequent analysis techniques.