Operating pressure influences over micro trenches in exposure time introduced atomic layer deposition

Tremendous interest has been placed on the atomic layer deposition (ALD) process as a thin film deposition technique capacity to deposit quality thin films. However, further comprehension of the ALD process is mandatory to increase the probability of achieving the necessary improvement, which can have a substantial impact on devices’ requiring properties that involve size, performance, and durability. It has been reported that pressure tends to impact growth per cycle. However, little has been done to investigate the specific effects of the – operating pressure on the mechanistic, species transport and reaction rates. Moreover, the effect of these prior properties due to complex topology elements, such as micro-trenches, has rarely been investigated. Hence, this study focuses on numerically investigating the effect between 1 and 10 Torr operating pressure along the ALD process using the computational fluid dynamic approach. A two-dimensional numerical simulation producing Al₂O₃ ALD thin film over a surface with micro-trenches is studied. Trimethyl-Aluminium and Ozone were utilized as the metal and oxidation source reactants. To assist in the precursor reaction process, a 2.5 s exposure time is added within the ALD sequence. The findings illustrated the fluid flow velocity, surface coverage, mass fraction, deposition rate and growth of the thin-film process.