Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology

We demonstrate understanding of different physicochemical properties of copolymers induced by systematic changes in their structural parameters, i.e.,chemical structure of comonomer unit, composition, molecular weight, and dispersity. The？terpolymers？were designed to be implemented in a chemically amplified resist (CAR) to form negative-tone patterns. With two basic repeating units of 4-hydroxystyrene and 2-ethyl-2-methacryloxyadamantane as monomers for conventional CARs,？the pendant group of the third methacrylate comonomer？was varied from aromatic,aliphatic lactone, to lactone rings, to modulate the interaction capability of？the copolymerchains with？n-butyl acetate, which is a negative-tone developer. Along with these structures, monomer composition, molecular weight, anddispersity？were also controlled. Physicochemical properties of the synthesized copolymers having controlled structures, i.e. dissolution behaviorsand quantified Hansen solubility parameters, surface wetting characteristics, and surface roughness, which can be important properties？affecting？patterning capability in high-resolution lithography, were explored.Furthermore, the feasibility to use experimentally determined Hansen solubility parameters of the copolymers for the prediction of pattern formation usinga coarse-grained model？was assessed.？Our comprehensive？studies？on the correlation of？the structural parameters of the copolymers？with final properties？offer？fundamental？avenues to attain effective designs of the complex CAR system toward the lithographic process to achieve sub-10 nm dimension, which is close to a single-chain dimension.