The Effect of Structure and Electrical Properties of the Mesa on the Electrostatic Chuck Force

Electrostatic chuck is one of the most important elements in the semiconductor field, mainly used in integrated circuit equipment and optical equipment, playing the role of carrying wafers and substrates. In this article, we use the physical vapor deposition method to make the mesa of Johnsen-Rahbek type electrostatic chuck. In this research, we built a vacuum chamber and used the back gas method to test the chuck force of the Johnsen-Rahbek type electrostatic chuck with different mesa heights and different chuck voltages. We built the mathematical model to study the effect of electrical properties and mechanical dimensions in chuck force with the equivalent capacitance method. The experiment and simulation results show that because of the low contact resistance, there is nearly no chuck force between the mesa and silicon wafers. And with the increasing height of the mesa and increasing the proportion of the area of the mesa, the chuck force between the mesa and silicon wafer decreases. In addition, we found that the surface topography has nearly no effect on the chuck force between the mesa and silicon wafer. This research has important guidance for the improvement of Johnsen-Rahbek effect theory and the structure designing of the electrostatic chuck, and provides a theoretical basis for the development of semiconductor equipment.