Lanthanum doped hafnium oxide thin films deposited on a lateral high aspect ratio structure using atomic layer deposition: A comparative study of surface composition and uniformity using x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry

Jennifer Emara*, Alireza M. Kia, Sascha Bönhardt, Clemens Mart, Kati Kühnel, Nora Haufe, Riikka L. Puurunen, Mikko Utriainen, Wenke Weinreich

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

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Abstract

Hafnium oxide (HfO2) thin films doped with lanthanum (La) can achieve ferroelectricity, making the material applicable in transistor and memory technologies. To downscale future devices in the semiconductor industry, the application of the doped HfO2 material requires deposition on complex microscopic three-dimensional (3D) structures. A widely used process for the preparation of doped HfO2 thin films is atomic layer deposition (ALD). With 3D geometries, it is challenging to deposit materials homogeneously and to effectively characterize them. To forego the difficulties in film characterization, two-dimensional (2D) PillarHall lateral high aspect ratio (LHAR) test structures are used. These structures expose a lateral surface to facilitate the conformality analysis of thin films deposited using two different ALD processes. In this work, we aim to further advance the arsenal of analysis techniques used to characterize La doped HfO2 thin films by using x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) to analyze uniformity and composition. The XPS technique can be applied and established as a method for the optimal analysis of thin films deposited on LHAR structures. Both techniques provide a complementary analysis of material formation, elemental distribution, measurement along the LHAR depth range, and can probe differences between deposition processes.

Original languageEnglish
Article number161408
Number of pages10
JournalApplied Surface Science
Volume680
Early online date11 Oct 2024
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 11 Oct 2024
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Keywords

  • Atomic layer deposition
  • Lanthanum doped hafnium oxide
  • Lateral high aspect ratio
  • PillarHall
  • Time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry
  • X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy

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