Appeal No. 2006-0375
Application 10/447,581
advanced by the examiner and appellants.
The plain language of independent claim 1, on which all other appealed claims depend,
specifies a method comprising at least the steps of etching with any manner of fluorine-based
plasma etchant, any manner of semiconductor wafer having thereon any manner of material stack
having at least two layers, wherein the “top layer” is a so-called “hard mask” which can have
more than one layer or surface, and rinsing the etched material stack with any manner of “a wet
clean process.” The transitional term “comprising” opens the claim to include any manner of
additional process steps and reactants. See generally, Exxon Chem. Pats., Inc. v. Lubrizol Corp.,
64 F.3d 1553, 1555, 35 USPQ2d 1801, 1802 (Fed. Cir. 1995) (“The claimed composition is
defined as comprising - meaning containing at least - five specific ingredients.”); In re Baxter,
656 F.2d 679, 686-87, 210 USPQ 795, 802-03 (CCPA 1981) (“As long as one of the monomers
in the reaction is propylene, any other monomer may be present, because the term ‘comprises’
permits the inclusion of other steps, elements, or materials.”). The plain language of dependent
claim 2, on which no other appealed claim depends, specifies that “said material stack is a
ferroelectric capacitor.” The plain language of dependent claims 3 through 15 further specifies
different ingredients for the fluorine-based plasma etchant and different ingredients or conditions
for the “wet clean” step, including the use of ingredients which provide a “wet etch” in claim 15.
Dependent claim 16 further specifies that “a top surface of said hard mask layer comprises” at
least “TiAlN.”
On this record, we cannot agree with the examiner that “the two steps of etching and wet
cleaning could be performed simultaneously” (answer, pages 6-7). Indeed, in the absence of
evidence or scientific explanation to the contrary, it would reasonably appear that the
performance of the “wet clean” step with the attendant presence of “wet clean” materials on the
surface of the stack would preclude the charged particles formed in the plasma from knocking
out atoms in the substrate by impact during plasma etching.3
We agree with appellants that Moise would not have described the claimed method to
one skilled in this art within the meaning of 35 U.S.C. § 102(b), and would not have taught or
suggested the claimed method to one of ordinary skill in this art within the meaning of 35 U.S.C.
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