Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 February 2011
As miniaturisation proceeds, the electrical properties of conductive films used in modem IC's are increasingly influenced by the grain sizes and the texture of the films. There is a need therefore to devise techniques which can examine these properties. Described in this work are two new cross-sectional TEM techniques for use on fully-processed IC's to determine quantitatively grain size distributions and the degree of texture in a film. The technique which investigates texture is used to determine how quickly the texture develops through a polysilicon film.