Investigation of gate oxide quality as a function of downstream plasma exposure during flash memory fabrication

Abstract

Gate oxide is the most critical oxidation step in the flash memory fabrication sequence. Surfaces free of contaminants are required to grow high quality gate oxides. A correlation between oxide quality and resist removal techniques has been highlighted at the R8 STMicroelectronics production fab, comparing Axcelis FusionGemini ES asher results with those of full wet techniques.