Theoretical investigation of in situ k-restore processes for damaged ultra-low-k materials

Ultra-low-k (ULK) materials are essential for today's production of integrated circuits (ICs). However, during the manufacturing process the ULK's low dielectric constant (k-value) increases due to the replacement of hydrophobic species with hydrophilic groups. We investigate the use of plasma enhanced fragmented silylation precursors to repair this damage. For this task the fragmentation of the silylation precursors OMCTS and DMADMS and their possible repair reactions are studied using density functional theory (DFT) and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations.