Since the beginning of my internship at CNSE, I have learned many things: from simpler ideas such as the safety requirements to work in the lab, to more complex skills like preparing different kind of compounds. Being here made me realize that you need to be very careful in every action you do; everything is important and a little change can alter your product.
The project I'm working on for my internship is synthesizing acid amplifiers. These compounds are part of a photoresist. The resist is a polymer that covers the silicon wafer. The resist film can be imaged using EUV light. The goal of the project is to improve the resist resolution, LER (Line Edge Roughness), and sensitivity so that smaller computer chips can be made. The photoresist prepared with acid amplifiers works with EUV lithography. The EUV light has a wavelength of approximately 13.5nm. When it comes over the wafer, it interacts with another part of the photoresist called PAG (Photo Acid Generator), to generate an acid which interacts with the acid amplifier to generate more acid in an autocatalytic way.
My participation during my internship consists of preparing some acid amplifiers. I am also working with software to simulate the strength of the bonds in the compounds and learning a little bit about how to get NMR spectrums.
Sara Cruz, CNSE Intern
July 6, 2009
