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US 11,857,997 B2Granted
Metal surface protection
AssigneeInternational Business Machines Corporation
InventorsAli Afzali-Ardakani, David L. Rath, Sarunya Bangsaruntip, George Gabriel Totir
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Abstract
Techniques regarding methods and/or apparatuses for protecting metal substrates during one or more lithography processes are provided. For example, one or more embodiments described herein can comprise a method that can include coating a metal substrate with a polymer film that self-assembles on a metal oxide positioned on a surface of the metal substrate. The method can also include covalently bonding the polymer film to the metal oxide.
Claims8
A method, comprising:
- providing a metal substrate having a plurality of metal oxide surfaces native to the metal substrate and positioned at multiple, non-continous locations of surfaces on the metal substrate, wherein the metal substrate has a thickness between 20 nanometers and 5 micrometers;
- coating the metal oxide surfaces with a polymer film that self-assembles one or more layers on the metal oxide surfaces, wherein the coating is performed via immersion of the metal oxide surfaces in an aqueous solution comprising the polymer film;
- covalently bonding the polymer film to the plurality of metal oxide surfaces by heating the metal substrate and the plurality of metal oxide surfaces on a hot plate at a temperature greater than or equal to 100 degrees Celsius and less than or equal to 140 degrees Celsius for between one and five minutes, and wherein the heating evaporates one or more solvents or surfactants from the aqueous solutions and catalyzes one or more interactions between the polymer film and the plurality of the metal oxide surfaces.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.