MASS-SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CVD PROCESSES

Chemical vapour deposition (CVD) processes are becoming increasingly popular for a variety of applications including those in the semiconductor industry. For further advancement of semiconductor processes it is becoming necessary to obtain a fundamental understanding of the reaction mechanisms involved in deposition of thin films by CVD. We have shown that the application of mass spectrometry can reveal useful information regarding the gas phase composition of a process and this may be related to the film properties to obtain a better understanding of the effects of deposition parameters on the layer characteristics. The use of mechanistic information has enabled us to solve non-uniformity problems associated with silicon deposition using novel types of wafer cages.