The semiconductor industry has experienced exponential growth, and has progressed in pursuit of higher device density, performance, and lower costs. Technological advances in integrated circuit (IC) materials and design have produced generations of ICs where each generation has smaller and more complex circuits than the previous generations. In the course of IC evolution, functional density (for example, the number of interconnected devices per chip area) has generally increased while geometry sizes have decreased. This scaling down process generally provides benefits by increasing production efficiency and lowering associated costs.
Semiconductor devices comprise ICs that are formed on semiconductor wafers by depositing many types of thin films of material over the semiconductor wafers, and patterning the thin films of material to form the integrated circuits. In the manufacturing scheme of an IC, the increased of the multi-integrated layer increase the reliability concerns of the semiconductor devices.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds