Process for improving the surface roughness of a semiconductor wafer

Abstract

The present invention relates to a process for reducing the roughness of the free surface of a semiconductor wafer, said process comprising a single annealing step for smoothing said free surface, said single annealing step being carried out as a RTA under an atmosphere of pure argon, characterized in that before the RTA a chemical cleaning of the wafer surface is carried out so as to reduce the amount of preliminary pollutants on the wafer.

Description

Process for improving surface roughness of semiconductor wafer technical field The present invention relates generally to the surface treatment of materials, and in particular to the treatment of wafers for the manufacture of components for use in microelectronics and / or optoelectronics. More precisely, the invention relates to a process for reducing the roughness of the free face of a semiconductor wafer, said process comprising a single annealing step for smoothing said free face, said single annealing step being carried out as RTA in a pure argon atmosphere . Background technique The term "free face" refers to the surface of a wafer that is exposed to the external environment (thus distinct from a surface defined by an internal interface between two layers of a multilayer wafer). It will be apparent from the description that the invention can be advantageously realized in combination with processes for producing thin layers, such as described in patent FR2681472 (alt...

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Problems solved by technology

Moreover, the hydrogen used in this variant is a volatile gas, which leads to the fact that it is possible to use extremely large amounts of hydrogen - while at the same time reducing the costs associated with wafer surface treatment has been pursued

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