The Present Status and Recent Advancements in Corona-Kelvin Non-Contact Electrical Metrology of Dielectrics for IC-Manufacturing

Non-contact electrical metrology offers a fast and cost saving monitoring of dielectrics in IC manufacturing process. This corona-Kelvin measuring technique has entered the maturity stage with about 400 tools installed in silicon IC-fabs. We discuss recent advancements that broaden the spectrum of monitoring parameters and enhance the precision of these measurements. We also discuss the current ongoing extension of corona-Kelvin metrology to the micro scale measurement on sites as small as 30µm x 30µm. This opens new possibilities for non-contact electrical testing of product wafers, rather than expensive process monitor wafers. Micro-measurement is illustrated using flash memory ONO structures and corona induced programming and erasing.