Resist materials design: Base-catalyzed chemical amplification

The search for advanced resists that can provide the high density of circuits and high throughput required for the new generations of microelectronic devices requires that highly stable chemically amplified materials be developed. In view of the high susceptibility of resists based on photoacid generation to environmental contamination, resulting in lessened performance, a program aiming at the development of chemically amplified resists utilizing photobase generation has been undertaken. In a first approach, the photogenerated amines we developed in the first stage of this project were used as catalysts for the decarboxylation of totally new resist systems containing active carboxylic acid pendant groups. The resists materials could be developed to afford negative tone images through wet development in aqueous base, or positive tone images through dry development using a gas-phase silylation reaction followed by oxygen plasma etching. The first patterning experiments carried out with two new resists utilizing photogenerated base have confirmed the validity of the approach.