Water and Copper Contamination in SiOC:H Damascene: Novel Characterization Methodology based on Triangular Voltage Sweep Measurements

We evaluated the triangular voltage sweep (TVS) method as a new technique to address the degradation mechanisms that occur in Cu/low-k interconnects. TVS measurements were performed on dedicated samples in order to systematically investigate the effects of water and Cu. We were able to resolve distinctive features characteristic of water and Cu. We demonstrate for the first time that the TVS methodology can successfully be applied to detect both water and Cu in sub-100 nm advanced Cu interconnects