Semiconductor International, May 2006

Like its predecessors, the updated International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) places metrology in a good news/bad news situation. The bad news is that, while the litho process range has been loosened somewhat, resulting in larger features intended to be made smaller through etch, OEMs must still meet stringent requirements associated with isolated lines after etch in the CD measurements area. The good news is that, at least to the 45 nm node and possibly the 32 nm node, it appears that metrology technologies such as CD-SEM and scatterometry can meet these requirements.

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