A Novel Low-temperature Gate Oxynitride For CMOS Technologies

A new-low temperature gate oxynitride has been developed for sub-0.25 pm CMOS technologies. In this process, nitrous oxide is cracked in a pre-furnace at high tem- perature to generate nitric oxide that flows into the main fur- nace where the gate oxidation is carried out at low tempera- ture. Physical analysis and gate oxide integrity data are used to demonstrate effective nitridation of the gate oxides grown in this fashion. The process was successfully integrated into a 0.15 pm, 1.5 V CMOS technology with 25 A physical gate oxide to minimize short channel effects and improve device performance and hot carrier reliability.