Appeal No. 2001-1559
Application No. 09/237,174
filling the trench with silicon oxide insulation material
and depositing the insulation material on the structure thus
produced in an ozone-activated CVD process;
selecting a material of the reference layer such that a
growth rate of the insulation material on the reference
layer is at least by a factor of two less than a growth rate
of the insulation material on a surface of the trench to be
covered, a ratio of a width of the deep region to a step
height of the shallow region being approximately equal to
2*"/("-1), where " corresponds to a ratio of the growth
rate of the insulation material on the surface of the trench
to be covered to the growth rate of the insulation material
on the reference layer.
The Examiner relies on the following references in rejecting
the claims:
Kameyama 4,472,240 Sep. 18, 1984
Sasaki et al. (Sasaki) 4,551,911 Nov. 12, 1985
Bertagnolli et al. (Bertagnolli)2 DE 42 11 050 Jul. 10, 1993
Bohr 5,536,675 Jul. 16, 1996
Appellants’ Admitted Prior Art, page 3.
Claims 1, 3, 5-12 and 15 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Sasaki in view of the
admitted prior art, Kameyama or Bohr and Bertagnolli.3
Rather than reiterate the viewpoints of the Examiner and
Appellants regarding the above-noted rejection, we make reference
to the answer (Paper No. 14, mailed January 26, 2001) for the
2 The English translation of the German document is provided by the
Translation Branch of USPTO, a copy of which accompanies this decision.
3 Although the Examiner includes claims 2, 4, 13 and 14 in the
rejection, these claims have been canceled in an amendment filed October 10,
2000 as paper No. 10.
3
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