US Patent Issued to Tokyo Electron on Sept. 22 for "Methods and structures for improving etch profile of underlying layers" (Japanese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Sept. 24 -- United States Patent no. 12,745,612, issued on Sept. 22, was assigned to Tokyo Electron Ltd. (Tokyo).

"Methods and structures for improving etch profile of underlying layers" was invented by Yen-Tien Lu (Tokyo) and Shihsheng Chang (Tokyo).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Semiconductor devices and corresponding methods of manufacture are disclosed. The method includes forming a first hardmask layer over a substrate, forming a second hardmask layer over the first hardmask layer, etching the second hardmask layer to form a pattern in the second hardmask layer, transferring the pattern to the first hardmask layer, removing the second hardmask layer and trimming an upper ...