Reliability Testing for the Next Generation of Microelectronic Devices

J. Plawsky, W. Gill, M. Riley, J. Borja, and B. Williams
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, USA
Published in 2010

Understanding and predicting the reliability of new generations of high and low-k dielectrics is increasingly important for gate oxides and interlayer dielectrics as both films have become thinner and scaling of device operating voltages has not kept pace with the decrease in the size of the dielectrics.
We have developed a series of COMSOL-based mass transfer-based models that have proven to be successful at correlating failure data from the literature or our own experiments. Our current generation of models now marry the Cu ion mass transfer models with models for trap creation and electron transport that should provide a predictive framework and that can be used to link I-t and I-V measurements. We have observed experimentally using porous SiCOH samples when we vary the bias voltage ramp rate in I-V testing, and what we think we will observe when we perform oscillating bias voltage experiments in I-t testing. The COMSOL model does an excellent job of fitting the I-V data.