Pore Size Distribution Measurement of Porous Low-k Dielectrics Using TR-SAXS

We have developed a method to determine the Pore Size Distribution (PSD) of porous low‐k dielectric materials. The method is based on a modified version of Small Angle X‐ray Scattering (SAXS). We fix the incident X‐ray angle such that it is a larger angle than the total reflection critical angle for the low‐k dielectric material, and a smaller angle than the critical angle for the substrate material. The scattered X‐rays are then collected using a two dimensional position sensitive X‐ray detector. Measurements were collected on a set of porous SiLK™, organic, low‐k dielectric, films. The results are compared with Transmission SAXS (T‐SAXS) measurements collected using Synchrotron Radiation (SR) as the X‐ray source.