Striking A Balance In Acoustic Inspection


Sound energy is a quick way to to spot voids, delamination, cracks, and other possible defects that are accessible from outside the chip or package, as well as some defects that are inside of chips. But acoustic inspection also is highly sensitive to different materials with different polarities, which can change the reflection of sound waves. Bill Zuckerman, product marketing manager at Nordso... » read more

Si Hardmask (Si-HM), EUV And Zero Defects


The multilayer system used in lithography consists of a planarizing carbon layer beneath a hardmask etch-transferring layer and capped with a standard photoresist coating. In the past, Brewer Science has discussed in-depth how the multilayer system helped to extend ArF (193 nm) immersion lithography to be able to print and transfer ever-shrinking features, ensuring enough process window especia... » read more

Will Materials Derail Moore’s Law?


Is Moore’s Law slowing down? Clearly, chipmakers are struggling to keep up with Moore’s Law these days. But one sometimes forgotten and critical technology could easily derail Moore’s Law--materials. In fact, the cost and complexity for electronic materials are increasing at each node. “Chemical and gas commodity procurement spends are growing rapidly due to process complexity and un... » read more