Polyimide alpha particle barrier

With the increase in packing density of dynamic RAMs, soft errors caused by alpha particles are becoming an increasingly important cause of device malfunctioning. (For further information on soft errors see Section 10.3.) Alpha particles are emitted from uranium and thorium isotopes residual in most packaging materials and thin films of polyimides deposited upon a chip surface have been successfully evaluated as alpha particle barriers. Polyimides can be made pure enough to contain no detectable amounts of uranium or thorium and a 40 xm thick film may reduce the soft error generation rate by up to 1000 times. A typical example of a commercially available polyimide alpha particle barrier is DuPont s Pyralin PIH 61454. 

Polyimides, both photodefinable and nonphotodefinable, are coming iato iacreased use. AppHcatioas iaclude planarizing iatedayer dielectrics oa iategrated circuits and for interconnects, passivation layers, thermal and mechanical stress buffers ia packagiag, alpha particle barriers oa memory devices, and ion implantation (qv) and dry etching masks. 

Organic polymers have attracted much interest in electrical and electronic applications because of their electrical insulating nature. Polyimides have gained much attention because of their excellent thermal stability and low dielectric constant. Polyimides have found applications in matrix resins for circuit boards, encapsulants, adhesives, passivation coatings, alpha particle barriers, ion implant masks and interlayer dielectrics."10... 

A barrier coating may also be required for protection against alpha particles. High-density devices can suffer soft errors when alpha particles emitted from trace quantities of thorium or uranium in packaging materials strike the active surface. Thus, the surface must be protected against this possibility. Polyimides are again recommended for such applications. 

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