The present disclosure provides a gas purge device and a gas purge method for purging a wafer container to clean wafers. The gas purge device includes a first nozzle and a gas gate. The first nozzle is coupled to a front-opening unified pod (FOUP) through a first port of the FOUP. The gas gate is coupled to the first nozzle via a first pipe. The gas gate includes a first mass flow controller (MFC), a second MFC, and a first switch unit. The first MFC is configured to control a first flow of a first gas. The second MFC is configured to control a second flow of a second gas. The first switch unit is coupled to the first MFC and the second MFC, and is configured to provide the first gas to the first nozzle through the first pipe or receive the second gas from the first nozzle through the first pipe according to a process configuration.

An apparatus and methods for selectively etching a particular layer are disclosed. The apparatus and methods are directed towards maintaining the etch rate of the particular layer, while keeping intact a non-etched layer. The etching process may be accomplished by co-flowing a hydrogen precursor gas and a fluorine precursor gas into a remote plasma unit. A resulting gas mixture may then be flowed onto the substrate having a silicon oxide layer as an etch layer and a silicon nitride layer as a non-etched layer, for example. A reaction between the resulting gas mixture and the particular layer takes place, resulting in etching of the silicon oxide layer while maintaining the silicon nitride layer in the above example.

Disclosed herein are systems and methods method for thin film deposition of molybdenum for source/drain formation. A deposition process may be performed in which the surface is contacted in the reaction chamber with a first oxygen-free molybdenum halide reactant at a first temperature, wherein said contacting with the first oxygen-free molybdenum halide reactant forms at least one layer of molybdenum on the substrate. In some embodiments, the temperature of the reaction chamber may be raised from the first temperature to a second temperature. In some embodiments, the substrate in the reaction chamber may be contacted with a second oxygen-free molybdenum halide reactant at the second temperature, wherein said contacting with the second oxygen-free molybdenum halide reactant forms at least one layer of molybdenum on the substrate. In some embodiments, the deposition at the second temperature may be repeated until a molybdenum-containing film of desired thickness is formed.

An ammonium fluoride gas may be used to form a protection layer for one or more interlayer dielectric layers, one or more insulating caps, and/or one or more source/drain regions of a semiconductor device during a pre-clean etch process. The protection layer can be formed through an oversupply of nitrogen trifluoride during the pre-clean etch process. The oversupply of nitrogen trifluoride causes an increased formation of ammonium fluoride, which coats the interlayer dielectric layer(s), the insulating cap(s), and/or the source/drain region(s) with a thick protection layer. The protection layer protects the interlayer dielectric layer(s), the insulating cap(s), and/or the source/drain region(s) during the pre-clean process from being etched by fluorine ions formed during the pre-clean process.

The present invention relates to a novel provided gallium arsenide substrates as well as the use thereof. The gallium arsenide substrates provided according to the invention exhibit a so far not obtained surface quality, in particular a homogeneity of surface properties, which is detectable by means of optical surface analyzers, by way of example by means of ellipsometric lateral substrate mapping for optical contact-free quantitative characterization.

A gallium arsenide substrate which exhibits at least one surface having a surface oxide layer comprising gallium and arsenic oxides and which exhibits at least one surface having, according to an ellipsometric lateral substrate mapping with an optical surface analyzer, based on a substrate diameter of 150 mm as reference, a defect number of <6000 and/or a total defect area of less than 2 cm.sup.2, wherein a defect is defined as a continuous area of greater than 1000 μm.sup.2 having a deviation from the average measurement signal in elipsometric lateral substrate mapping with an optical surface analyzer of at least ±0.05%.

A method for conditioning a plasma processing chamber including a chuck is provided. The method comprises a plurality of cycles, wherein each cycle comprises cleaning an interior of the plasma processing chamber and the chuck and forming a silicon oxide based coating on the interior of the plasma processing chamber and the chuck. The silicon oxide based coating has a first layer and a second layer.

Implementations of the present disclosure generally relate to methods and apparatuses for epitaxial deposition on substrate surfaces. More particularly, implementations of the present disclosure generally relate to an integrated system for processing N-type metal-oxide semiconductor (NMOS) devices. In one implementation, a cluster tool for processing a substrate is provided. The cluster tool includes a pre-clean chamber, an etch chamber, one or more pass through chambers, one or more outgassing chambers, a first transfer chamber, a second transfer chamber, and one or more process chambers. The pre-clean chamber and the etch chamber are coupled to a first transfer chamber. The one or more pass through chambers are coupled to and disposed between the first transfer chamber and the second transfer chamber. The one or more outgassing chambers are coupled to the second transfer chamber. The one or more process chambers are coupled to the second transfer chamber.

Implementations of the present disclosure generally relates to a transfer chamber coupled to at least one vapor phase epitaxy chamber a plasma oxide removal chamber coupled to the transfer chamber, the plasma oxide removal chamber comprising a lid assembly with a mixing chamber and a gas distributor; a first gas inlet formed through a portion of the lid assembly and in fluid communication with the mixing chamber; a second gas inlet formed through a portion of the lid assembly and in fluid communication with the mixing chamber; a third gas inlet formed through a portion of the lid assembly and in fluid communication with the mixing chamber; and a substrate support with a substrate supporting surface; a lift member disposed in a recess of the substrate supporting surface and coupled through the substrate support to a lift actuator; and a load lock chamber coupled to the transfer chamber.

A processing method includes: disposing a workpiece in a processing container of a processing apparatus, and maintaining an inside of the processing container in a vacuum state; providing a cluster nozzle in the processing container; supplying a cluster generating gas to the cluster nozzle and adiabatically expanding the cluster generating gas in the cluster nozzle, thereby generating gas clusters; generating plasma in the cluster nozzle to ionize the gas clusters and injecting the ionized gas clusters onto the workpiece; supplying a reactive gas to the cluster nozzle and exposing the reactive gas to the plasma such that the reactive gas becomes monomer ions or radicals; and supplying the monomer ions or radicals to the processing container, thereby exerting a chemical reaction on a substance present on a surface of the workpiece.