A novel method of electron-beam (EB) writing to reduce line-edge roughness (LER) called edge-enhancement writing (EEW) is described. EEW involves writing a fine line along a pattern edge at a high dose. This provides a steep profile of the energy deposited at the edge. The high exposure dose breaks up aggregates of resist polymer at the edge, which cause LER. Moreover, in EEW the background energy in unexposed regions due to proximity effects is also reduced by control of the dose. This increases the energy contrast at the edge, thereby preventing the appearance of aggregates on the sidewall due to undesired dissolution of the edge region. The resulting energy profile is quite different from that obtained with conventional proximity effect corrections. Experimental results and simulations of the deposited energy profile have demonstrated the effectiveness of EEW.
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Yamazaki et al. (2003) studied this question.
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