The organic silsesquioxanne, methylsilsesquioxanne (MSQ), has a low dielectric constant because of its lower film density compared to thermal oxide. However, the quality of MSQ film is degraded by the damage of oxygen plasma and hygroscopic behavior during photoresist stripping. In this work, we studied the plasma treatment for improving the quality of MSQ. The leakage current of MSQ decreases as the plasma treatment time is increased. The dielectric constant of plasma‐treatment sample remains constant (∼2.7). In addition, the thermal stability of MSQ film can be enhanced. The role of plasma is to convert the surface layer of organic MSQ into organic type by decomposition of the alkyl group and thus form a passivation layer. The inert passivation layer enhances the resistance to moisture uptake and plasma attack. Therefore, plasma‐treatment greatly improves the quality of low k MSQ film and removes the issue of photoresist stripping in the integrated process.
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Chang et al. (1999) studied this question.