Appeal No. 2005-0585
Application No. 09/821,478
OPINION
I. The rejection of claims 1, 3-8, 10-14, and 16-20 under 35
U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Tao in view of Ma
and further view of Horak
We limit our consideration to claims 1 and 4, as stated
supra.
A. The Examiner’s Position
The examiner’s position for this rejection is set forth on
pages 5-8 of the answer. The examiner’s position is summarized
below.
The examiner states that the claimed subject matter is
directed to a method of compensating for nested-to-isolated
pattern bias. Answer, pages 5-6. The examiner states that
positive bias is compensated for by adding a sputtering
component to the etch chemistry, while negative bias is adjusted
for by the electrical bias on the substrate (“space charge”
effect). Answer, pages 5-6.
The examiner states that the instant claims recite
providing a structure with a first critical dimension (CD) and
lithographically reducing the CD by an O2-containing trimming
etch. The claims further recite correcting the CD-bias between
nested and isolated features during a plasma-etch, and also the
etching parameters for the process. Answer, page 6.
The examiner finds that Tao teaches a method for narrowing
gate electrodes on a device. The steps comprise (a) forming a
stack layer and patterning the photoresist, (b) optionally
trimming the resist pattern, (c) etching the anti-reflection
coating (ARC) and hardmask and trimming the hard mask to a sub-
lithographic dimension (if not trimmed by the photoresist), and
(d) etching the gate to the desired sub-lithographic dimension.
These steps are shown in Figs. 2-6. The examiner finds that Tao
3
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007