Silicide for contacts and interconnects

The use of silicide materials in silicon VLSI technology is reviewed in three most important areas. The application of silicides to device contacts for lowering the contact resistance and/or controlling Schottky barrier heights. The application of silicides on top of polysilicon (Polycide) as gate materials in MOS devices for enhancing the interconnections. And, the application of silicides to all diffusion and polysilicon areas simultaneously by using self-aligned scheme (Salicide) for reducing device series resistance, and enhancing interconnects. In each case, the choice of materials, the critical processing parameters, and its technical constraints are discussed.