Semiconductor device having metal silicide regions of differing thicknesses above the gate electrode and the source/drain regions, and method of making same

Abstract

The present invention is directed to a semiconductor device (100) having enhanced electrical performance characteristics, and a method of making such a device. In one illustrative embodiment, the semiconductor device (100) is comprised of a polysilicon gate electrode (104) positioned above a gate insulation layer (105), a plurality of source/drain regions (109) formed in a semiconducting substrate (101), a first metal silicide region (111A) positioned above the gate electrode (104), a second metal silicide region (107) positioned above each of the source/drain regions (109), wherein the first metal silicide region (111A) is approximately 2-10 times thicker than each of the second metal silicide regions (107). In one illustrative embodiment, the inventive method disclosed herein comprises forming a first layer of a refractory metal (110) above a layer of polysilicon (104), and converting the refractory metal layer (110) to a metal suicide layer (111), and patterning the metal silicide layer (111) and the gate electrode layer (104) to form a metal silicide region (111A) above the gate electrode (104). The method further comprises forming a plurality of source/drain regions (109) in the substrate (101), forming a second layer comprised of a refractory metal above at least the gate stack (122) and the source/drain regions (109). The method concludes with converting at least a portion of the second layer of refractory metal to a second metal silicide region above each of the source/drain regions (109).

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.