Systems and methods of compensating for filling material losses in electroplating processes
AssigneeTaiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd.
InventorsChih-Yi CHANG, Liang-Yueh Ou YANG, Chen-Yuan KAO, Hung-Wen SU
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Abstract
A computer-implemented system and method of compensating for filling material losses in a semiconductor process. The computer-implemented method includes determining using a computer a pattern density difference between a first circuit pattern above a semiconductor substrate and a second circuit pattern adjacent to the first pattern. A dummy pattern is inserted between the first pattern and the second pattern so as to compensate for an estimated loss of filling material induced during electrochemical plating by the pattern density difference exceeding a threshold pattern density difference.
Claims20
A computer-implemented method, comprising:
- a. determining using a computer a pattern density difference between a pattern density of a first circuit pattern above a semiconductor substrate and a pattern density of a second circuit pattern adjacent to the first circuit pattern;
- b. inserting a dummy pattern between the first circuit pattern and the second circuit pattern so as to compensate for an estimated loss of filling material during electrochemical plating induced by the pattern density difference exceeding a threshold pattern density difference.
A computer implemented system, comprising:
- a. a tangible, non-transitory computer readable storage medium encoded with data representing an initial layout of an integrated circuit pattern layer having a plurality of circuit patterns;
- b. a special-purpose computer configured to perform the steps of:
- i. determining a difference between a pattern density of a first circuit pattern and a pattern density of a second circuit pattern adjacent to the first circuit pattern;
- ii. comparing the determined pattern density difference with a threshold pattern density difference;
- iii. selecting a dummy pattern so as to compensate for an estimated loss of filling material during electrochemical plating at a boundary of the first and second circuit patterns based on the comparison;
- and
- iv. inserting the dummy pattern between the first circuit pattern and the second circuit pattern.
A computer-implemented method, comprising:
- a. receiving an initial layout comprising an integrated circuit pattern layer having a plurality of circuit patterns in a computer;
- b. analyzing the initial layout to determine a difference between a pattern density of a first circuit pattern region and a pattern density of a second circuit pattern region adjacent to the first pattern;
- c. comparing the determined pattern density difference with a threshold pattern density difference stored in a tangible, non-transitory machine readable storage medium;
- and
- d. generating a revised layout based on the comparison including dummy patterns positioned in the second circuit pattern region so as to compensate for an estimated loss of filling material during electrochemical plating in the first circuit pattern region.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.