Advances in semiconductor manufacturing go hand in hand with new developments in devices, materials, fabrication technology, and metrology. The mission of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING is to publish papers critical to the practicing engineer and to the researcher involved in the broad, interdisciplinary challenges of IC manufacturing. In recognition of the importance of work in this area, each year the Transactions makes a Best Paper Award to the authors of that paper considered by the TRANSACTIONS’ Editorial Staff and reviewers to be the outstanding paper published during the year. The Award is based on the accuracy, originality, and importance of the technical concepts, as well as the quality and readability of the manuscript. The Best Paper is also based on the immediate or potential impact that this work will have on the overall semiconductor manufacturing industry.

The Award for the 2001 TRANSACTIONS ON SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING Best Paper goes to "Specular Spectroscopic Scatterometry" by Xinhui Niu, Nickhil Jakatdar, Junwei Bao, and Costas J. Spanos. This paper, which appeared in the May 2001 issue, was chosen because it represents the improvements that can be gained by the development and application of advanced metrology in semiconductor manufacturing. The paper describes the measurement of the diffraction response of light at a fixed angle of incidence for multiple wavelengths, and the coupling of this information with diffraction models to extract topographic profile information from one-dimensional periodic structures. Comparisons between in-situ spectroscopic scatterometry-based measurements and extractions in lithography and etch technology are compared with CD-SEM and CD-AFM measurements. The approach is suggested to be extendible to future sub-100 nm technology generations. The work is already having a substantial impact within the semiconductor community; several of the authors are now with Timbre Technologies, Inc., where this work is being advanced and brought to users in the industry.

In ceremonies on October 15th at the 2002 International Symposium on Semiconductor Manufacturing (ISSM) in Tokyo, Japan, David Hodges made the award to the authors. Prof. Hodges, chairman of the T-SM Steering Committee and Founding Editor, presented certificates and award checks, and highlighted both the contributions of the paper and the continuing relationship between the TRANSACTIONS and the annual ISSM and Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conferences (ASMC).

Xinhui Niu received the B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China, in 1990. He studied two years in the graduate program in the Computer Sciences at Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. He received the M.S. degree In computer sciences and engineering from the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, in 1994, and the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering and computer sciences from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1999. He is currently the Chief Scientist at Timbre Technologies, Inc. He is an expert on simulation, metrology, and process control for semiconductor manufacturing. Apart from his experience in electrical engineering, he is also interested in computer languages, numerical analysis, user interfaces, databases, Internet computing, operating systems, and distributed systems.

Nickhil Jakatdar received the Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering (with distinction) from the University of Pune, India, where he received the best graduating senior award from the School of Engineering. He received both the Master's degree and the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering and computer sciences from the University of California, Berkeley. He is currently the Chief Technology Officer of Timbre Technologies, Inc. He has conducted research on simulation, metrology, and process control for semiconductor manufacturing processes at various technology companies. He has also consulted for metrology companies. He has ten patents pending in the field of lithography and metrology and has more than 20 publications in this area.

Junwei Bao received the B.S. degree in physics from Beijing University, Beijing, China, in 1996, and the M.S. degree in electrical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2000. He is working toward the Ph.D. degree in metrology for process control, lithography process characterization, and monitoring in the Berkeley Computer Aided Manufacturing BCAM) group. He has research experience in the area of metrology, lithography process simulation and monitoring, and integrated optical device simulation. He was working as intern engineer at National Semiconductor, Santa Clara, CA, on lithography process development during the summer of 1998, and at Advanced Micro Devices, Sunnyvale, CA, on scatterometry characterization during the summer of 2000.

Costas J. Spanos (S'79-M'81-SM'96-F'00) was born in 1957 in Piraeus, Greece. He received the electrical engineering diploma (with honors) from the National Technical University, Athens, Greece in 1980 and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, in 1981 and 1985, respectively, working on the development of Statistical Technology CAD systems. From June 1985 to July 1988, he was with the advanced CAD development group of Digital Equipment Corporation in Hudson MA, where he worked on the statistical characterization, simulation and diagnosis of VLSI processes. In 1988, he joined the faculty at the department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences of the University of California, Berkeley, where he is now a Professor, and was the Director of the Berkeley Micro fabrication Laboratory until the summer of 2000. He has served in the technical committees of the IEEE Symposium on VLSI Technology, the International Semiconductor Manufacturing Sciences Symposium, the Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Symposium and the International Workshop on Statistical Metrology. He was the editor of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING from 1991 to 1994. He has published more than 100 referred publications and has received best paper awards in 1992 and 1997. His research interests include the development of flexible manufacturing systems, the application of statistical analysis in the design and fabrication of integrated circuits, and the development and deployment of novel sensors and computer-aided techniques in semiconductor manufacturing. In 2000, he was elected Fellow of the IEEE for contributions and leadership in semiconductor manufacturing.

Duane Boning
T-SM Editor
MIT
Cambridge, MA, USA