Abstract
Applications of SIMS in failure analyses of semiconductor devices

Zhixiong Jiang

Freescale Semiconductor, Inc., 3501 Ed Bluestein Boulevard, MD: K10, Austin, TX 78721, USA

Analyses aimed to understand the cause of device failures or process drift are common tasks in the semiconductor industry. Among various inspection techniques, SIMS is one of the well established approaches in device/process failure analyses. It is capable of detecting drift in the in-depth distribution of various species as a result of mis-process. SIMS is also a unique technique in examining contamination in failed devices thanks to its great detection sensitivity. A typical failure analysis with SIMS is often directly conducted onto failed devices following dedicate deprocess of the devices or on test wafers specifically prepared to reflect the processes that have caused the device failures. In this presentation, we will talk about some examples of SIMS failure analyses in a variety of device regions with contamination or misprocess during ion implantation, cleaning, thin film growth, etc.

Biography

Dr. Zhixiong Jiang is a senior staff scientist in the SIMS lab of the Physical Analysis Laboratories (TX) of Freescale Semiconductor, Inc (former Semiconductor Product Sector of Motorola Inc.). At this role he has developed numerous SIMS analytical techniques that have been intensively used in process monitoring and device characterization in Freescale Semiconductor. Before he joined Motorola Inc. in 2000, he was a senior research engineer in the Department of Failure Analysis and Reliability, Institute of Microelectronics (IME), Singapore. In IME he performed development and applications of advanced surface analysis techniques of SIMS, Auger and SPM to support R&D and manufacturing of semiconductor industry in Singapore. From 1995 to 1998, Dr. Jiang was a postdoctoral research fellow in the Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands, where he studied fundamentals and applications of low energy SIMS. He earned his Ph.D in 1995 from Tsinghua University in Beijing, under supervision of Prof. Liangzhen Cha. Dr. Jiang has been an active researcher in the area of SIMS and made numerous contributions to the fundamentals and applications of SIMS. He (co-)authored over 60 publications in journals and conference proceedings, holds two US patents, and reviewed papers for a couple of precious journals.