Specific Process Knowledge/Thin film deposition/Deposition of Tantalum/Sputtering of Ta

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Sputtering of Ta

Ta can be DC sputtered in the Sputter-System (Lesker) as well as in the cluster sputter system. You will find information on the pressure, max power and expected deposition rate for the Sputter-System Lesker here in LabAdviser. To see all the deposition parameters used in that machine by others, search the Process Log in LabManager.

Below you will find information on the surface roughness of sputtered Ta films from the Sputter-System (Lesker).

Surface roughness optimization

By Bjarke Thomas Dalslet @Nanotech.dtu.dk

The Lesker CMS 18 sputter system provides thin films of varying surface roughness. This roughness was verified to be dependent on the sputtered material, sputter mode (DC or RF) and the substrate bias strength. Other probable factors include sputter power and pressure. Here you find the results for Ta. Similar studies were carried out for SiO2 and Si.

The "Ta" study was done on clean Si substrates. The sputter pressure was 3 mTorr using DC sputtering of a Ta target. Some O2 was added to wafer 25 and 26 to make TaO. In order to get fully oxidized films, up to 30-45% O2 should be added. Consult the thesis of Carsten Christensen for details on TaO.

Ta

Wafer nr RF bias (W) Reactive O2 (%) Power(W) Rq (RMS) (nm) Thickness (nm)
blank1 0 0 180 0.209
16 10 0 180 0.36 56
24 20 0 180 0.357
25 20 9 180 0.202 110
26 20 5 180 0.194 95
27 15 0 180 0.413
28 25 0 180 0.164
31 30 0 180 0.3