Vapor-phase precursor seeding for diamond film deposition
AssigneesApplied Materials, Inc., National University of Singapore
InventorsSze Chieh Tan, Vicknesh Sahmuganathan, Eswaranand Venkatasubramanian, Abhijit Basu Mallick, John Sudijono, Jiteng Gu, Kian Ping Loh
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Methods of depositing an adamantane film are described, which may be used in the manufacture of integrated circuits. Methods include processing a substrate in which an adamantane seed layer is deposited on a substrate, converting to a diamond nuclei layer having an increased crystallinity relative to the adamantane seed layer and then grown into full nanocrystalline diamond film from the diamond nuclei layer.
Claims19
A method of forming a nanocrystalline diamond film,
- the method comprising:
- forming an adamantane seed layer by exposing a substrate surface to adamantane vapor in a first plasma process chamber for a first time and generating a first plasma in the first plasma process chamber for a first plasma time;
- converting the adamantane seed layer to a diamond nuclei layer having an increased crystallinity relative to the adamantane seed layer in a second plasma process chamber with a second plasma including a second plasma source;
- and
- growing a full nanocrystalline diamond film from the diamond nuclei layer.
A method of forming a nanocrystalline diamond film, the method comprising:
- forming an adamantane seed layer by exposing a substrate surface to adamantane vapor in a first plasma process chamber for a first time and generating a first plasma in the first plasma process chamber for a first plasma time;
- converting the adamantane seed layer to a diamond nuclei layer having an increased crystallinity relative to the adamantane seed layer;
- and
- growing a full nanocrystalline diamond film from the diamond nuclei layer in a second plasma process chamber using a conductively/inductively coupled plasma, microwave plasma, pulsed discharge plasma, hot filament or electron cyclotron resonance plasma.
A method of forming a nanocrystalline diamond film, the method comprising:
- forming an adamantane seed layer by exposing a substrate surface to adamantane vapor in a first plasma process chamber for a first time and generating a first plasma in the first plasma process chamber for a first plasma time, the first plasma comprises one or more of argon, nitrogen, CxHy, carbon dioxide or molecular hydrogen gases, the substrate surface is positioned a first distance from a first plasma source in the first plasma chamber greater than or equal to 10 mm;
- converting the adamantane seed layer to a diamond nuclei layer having an increased crystallinity relative to the adamantane seed layer in a second plasma process chamber with a second plasma, a second plasma source generating the second plasma comprising one or more of a power less than 10 kW, the substrate surface positioned a distance of less than 10 cm from the second plasma source;
- and
- growing a full nanocrystalline diamond film from the diamond nuclei layer in the second plasma process chamber using a third plasma comprising one or more of a power greater than 50 W with a duty cycle greater than 60%.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.