A method for manufacturing a semiconductor device includes conformally depositing a liner layer on a top surface of a dielectric layer, and on sidewall and bottom surfaces of an opening in the dielectric layer, annealing the liner layer, wherein the annealing is performed in at least one of a nitrogen (N.sub.2) and ammonia (NH.sub.3) ambient, at a temperature of about 60 C. to about 500 C., and at a power of about 200 Watts to about 4500 Watts, and forming a conductive layer on the liner layer on the top surface of the dielectric layer, and on the liner layer in a remaining portion of the opening.

A method for forming a semiconductor device structure is provided. The method includes receiving a structure having a first portion and a second portion, and a top surface of the first portion is higher than a top surface of the second portion. The method also includes forming a first material layer over the first portion and the second portion of the structure and forming a first material layer over the first portion and the second portion of the structure. The method further includes thinning the second material layer until the first material layer is exposed and removing a portion of the second material layer over the second portion of the structure to expose the first material layer thereunder. In addition, the method includes thinning the first material layer to expose the structure.

A method is presented for forming a vertical field effect transistor (VFET) structure. The method includes forming a plurality of vertical fins over a substrate, forming a dummy gate between the plurality of vertical fins, removing the dummy gate with a subway etch to define a gate cavity, and forming a high-k metal gate (HKMG) stack within the gate cavity. The method further includes forming the first and second source/drain regions before the HKMG stack. The method further includes defining the HKMG stack by a replacement metal gate (RMG) process, the RMG process defined in part by the subway etch. The subway etch enables removal of the dummy gate from a side portion of the VFET structure.

Techniques are disclosed for forming transistor devices having reduced parasitic contact resistance relative to conventional devices. The techniques can be implemented, for example, using a standard contact stack such as a series of metals on, for example, silicon or silicon germanium (SiGe) source/drain regions. In accordance with one example such embodiment, an intermediate boron doped germanium layer is provided between the source/drain and contact metals to significantly reduce contact resistance. Numerous transistor configurations and suitable fabrication processes will be apparent in light of this disclosure, including both planar and non-planar transistor structures (e.g., FinFETs), as well as strained and unstrained channel structures. Graded buffering can be used to reduce misfit dislocation. The techniques are particularly well-suited for implementing p-type devices, but can be used for n-type devices if so desired.

A semiconductor device includes a source metallization, a source region of a first conductivity type in contact with the source metallization, a body region of a second conductivity type which is adjacent to the source region. The semiconductor device further includes a first field-effect structure including a first insulated gate electrode and a second field-effect structure including a second insulated gate electrode which is electrically connected to the source metallization. The capacitance per unit area between the second insulated gate electrode and the body region is larger than the capacitance per unit area between the first insulated gate electrode and the body region.

The present disclosure describes a fin-like field-effect transistor (FinFET). The device includes one or more fin structures over a substrate, each with source/drain (S/D) features and a high-k/metal gate (HK/MG). A first HK/MG in a first gate region wraps over an upper portion of a first fin structure, the first fin structure including an epitaxial silicon (Si) layer as its upper portion and an epitaxial growth silicon germanium (SiGe), with a silicon germanium oxide (SiGeO) feature at its outer layer, as its middle portion, and the substrate as its bottom portion. A second HK/MG in a second gate region, wraps over an upper portion of a second fin structure, the second fin structure including an epitaxial SiGe layer as its upper portion, an epitaxial Si layer as it upper middle portion, an epitaxial SiGe layer as its lower middle portion, and the substrate as its bottom portion.

The present invention relates generally to semiconductors, and more particularly, to a structure and method of minimizing shorting between epitaxial regions in small pitch fin field effect transistors (FinFETs). In an embodiment, a dielectric region may be formed in a middle portion of a gate structure. The gate structure be formed using a gate replacement process, and may cover a middle portion of a first fin group, a middle portion of a second fin group and an intermediate region of the substrate between the first fin group and the second fin group. The dielectric region may be surrounded by the gate structure in the intermediate region. The gate structure and the dielectric region may physically separate epitaxial regions formed on the first fin group and the second fin group from one another.

A method of forming a gate structure for a semiconductor device that includes forming first spacers on the sidewalls of replacement gate structures that are present on a fin structure, wherein an upper surface of the first spacers is offset from an upper surface of the replacement gate structure, and forming at least second spacers on the first spacers and the exposed surfaces of the replacement gate structure. The method may further include substituting the replacement gate structure with a functional gate structure having a first width portion in a first space between adjacent first spacers, and a second width portion having a second width in a second space between adjacent second spacers, wherein the second width is greater than the first width.

A semiconductor structure includes a substrate having thereon a dielectric layer. An opening is formed in the dielectric layer. The opening includes a bottom surface and a sidewall surface. A diffusion barrier layer is conformally disposed along the sidewall surface and the bottom surface of the opening. A nucleation metal layer is conformally disposed on the diffusion barrier layer. A bulk metal layer is disposed on the nucleation metal layer. A film-growth retarding layer is disposed between the nucleation metal layer and the bulk metal layer.

A method for fabricating semiconductor device is disclosed. The method includes the steps of: providing a substrate having a logic region and high-voltage (HV) region; forming a first gate structure on the logic region and a second gate structure on the HV region; forming an interlayer dielectric (ILD) layer around the first gate structure and the second gate structure; forming a patterned hard mask on the HV region; and transforming the first gate structure into a metal gate.