Evaluation of Replicated Dynamic Random Access Memory Cell Patterns using X-Ray Lithography

We have evaluated the exposure latitude and the mask linearity of the lines and spaces (L/S), the isolated lines and the cell patterns used for DRAMs for various sizes down to 0.12 µ m. The exposure latitude was larger than 10% for all types of patterns with sizes larger than 0.12 µ m, using a mask of contrast of 3.7 in a mask-to-wafer gap of 20 µ m. We found that the mask linearity is insufficient and that mask pattern bias is required. The image shortening effect in the cell pattern was also evaluated. The results showed that the value of the shortening is higher when the design rule is smaller, the pattern density is sparser and the mask-to-wafer gap is larger. The value of the shortening in a 0.12-µ m- design- rule cell pattern was 13 nm, which is small enough to be corrected by simply giving a bias in the mask pattern.