IC interconnect transmission line effects due to the characteristics of a silicon substrate and current return path impedances are physically investigated and experimentally characterized. With the investigation, a novel transmission line model is developed, taking these effects into account. Then an accurate signal delay on the IC interconnect lines is analyzed by using the transmission line model. The transmission line effects of the metal-insulator-semiconductor IC interconnect structure are experimentally verified with s-parameter-based wafer level signal-transient characterizations for various test patterns. They are designed and fabricated with a 0.35 µm CMOS process technology. Throughout this work, it is demonstrated that the conventional ideal RC- or RLC-model of the IC interconnects without considering these detailed physical phenomena is not accurate enough to verify the pico-second level timing of high-performance VLSI circuits.

The quality of Si substrates affecting the oxide reliability was investigated using various kinds of test structures like flat capacitor, field edge array and gate edge array. The field edge array test structure which resembles the conditions found for real device is shown to be quite effective to determine the quality of oxides. Oxide grown on a P type epitaxial layer on P+ silicon substrate shows the highest reliability in all test structures. Gettering of heavy metals and/or crystal defects by the P+ silicon substrate is the dominant mechanism for the improvement of the oxide reliability. H2 annealed silicon shows a good reliability if monitored using the flat capacitor. However, using the field edge array test structure, which is strongly influenced by real device process, the reliability of the oxide grown on H2 annealed silicon degrades.

Copper contamination behavior is studied, depending on the pH level, conductivity type P or N of a silicon substrate, and contamination method of copper. If the pH level of a copper containing solution is adjusted by using ammonia, copper atoms and ammonia molecules produce copper ion complexes. Accordingly, the amount of copper adsorption on the substrate surface is decreased. When N-type silicon substrates are contaminated by means of copper containing solutions, copper atoms on the surfaces diffuse into bulk crystal even at room temperature. But for P-type silicon substrates, copper atoms are transferred into bulk crystal only after high temperature annealing. In the case of silicon substrates contaminated by contact with metallic copper, no copper atom diffusion into bulk crystal was observed. The above mentioned copper contamination behavior can be explained by the charge transfer interaction of copper atoms with silicon substrates.