Surface Treatment and Adhesion Study

In photolithography, it is often the case that the resist has difficulty adhering to a wafer due to its hydrophobic nature. The purpose of this study was to determine the best method for avoiding such adhesion problems. This study describes that four different surface treatments, (1) No bake before resist coating, (2) Bake at 115ºC before priming, (3) SURPASS coating, and (4) HDMS priming, are examined for UV lithography of sub-ten micron-sized lines and pillar arrays, and that HDMS vapor priming is the most effective surface treatment in promoting adhesion.