Surface Modification of Block Copolymer Through Sulfur Containing Plasma Treatment

Some of the important issues of block copolymer (BCP) as an application to the potential low cost next generation lithography are thermal stability and deformation during pattern transfer process in addition to defect density, line edge/width roughness, etc. In this study, sulfur containing plasma treatment was used to modify the BCP and the effects of the plasma on the properties of plasma treated BCP were investigated. The polystyrene hole pattern obtained from polystyrene polystyrene-block-poly(methyl methacrylate) (PS-b-PMMA) was initially degraded when the polystyrene hole was annealed at 190 °C for 15 min. However, when the hole pattern was treated using sulfur containing plasmas using H2S or SF6 up to 2 min, possibly due to the sulfurization of the polystyrene hole surface, no change in the hole pattern was observed after the annealing even though there is a slight change in hole shapes during the plasma treatment. The optimized plasma treated polystyrene pattern showed the superior characteristics as the mask layer by showing better thermal stability, higher chemical inertness, and higher etch selectivity during plasma etching.