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Thermal stability, adhesion and electrical studies on (Ti,Zr)N x thin films as low resistive diffusion barriers between Cu and Si

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Abstract

In this study, we investigated the thermal stability, wettability, adhesion and reliability of (Ti,Zr)N x films used as the diffusion barrier between Cu and Si. (Ti,Zr)N x films were prepared by DC reactive magnetron sputtering from a Ti-5 at. % Zr alloy target in N2/Ar gas mixtures. A minimum film resistivity of 59.3 µω cm was obtained at an N2/Ar flow ratio of 2.75, which corresponds to the near stoichiometric composition (N/(Ti,Zr) ratio ∼0.95). The sheet resistance of Cu/(Ti,Zr)N0.95/Si was not significantly increased until annealing above 750°C, indicating good thermal stability. On the other hand, the adhesion energy between Cu and the (Ti,Zr)Nx film was reduced as the N/Ti ratio was increased. To obtain reliable performance on stress-induced-voiding (SIV) and electromigration (EM) tests, we proposed to use (Ti,Zr)/(Ti,Zr)N x /(Ti,Zr) tri-layers. We suggest that the interfacial adhesion between barrier and Cu plays an important role in reliability. The proposed tri-layer structure may be a promising candidate for a barrier, as it exhibits excellent reliability without increasing resistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu, 300, Taiwan

    Cheng-Lin Huang & Chih-Huang Lai

  2. Department of Chemical Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei, 106, Taiwan

    Po-Hao Tsai, Yu-Lin Kuo, Jing-Cheng Lin & Chiapyng Lee

  3. Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taipei, 106, Taiwan

    Yu-Lin Kuo

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Huang, CL., Lai, CH., Tsai, PH. et al. Thermal stability, adhesion and electrical studies on (Ti,Zr)N x thin films as low resistive diffusion barriers between Cu and Si. Electron. Mater. Lett. 10, 551–556 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13391-013-3145-8

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