Ex Parte Chang et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 28, 201613212904 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 28, 2016) Copy Citation United States Patent and Trademark Office UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O.Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www.uspto.gov APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 13/212,904 08/18/2011 Jen-Chi Chang 2011-0090 / 24061.1804 7169 42717 7590 12/30/2016 HAYNES AND BOONE, LLP IP Section 2323 Victory Avenue Suite 700 Dallas, TX 75219 EXAMINER AHMED, SELIM U ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2816 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/30/2016 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): ipdocketing@haynesboone.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte JEN-CHI CHANG, CHUN-LI LIN, KAI-SHIUNG HSU, MING- SHIOU KUO, WEN-LONG LEE, PO-HSIUNG LEU, and DING-I LIU Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 Technology Center 2800 Before BEVERLY A. FRANKLIN, N. WHITNEY WILSON, and DEBRA L. DENNETT, Administrative Patent Judges. FRANKLIN, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants request our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 3, 5—15, and 21—25. We have jurisdiction over the appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Claim 1 is illustrative of Appellants’ subject matter on appeal and is set forth below (with text in bold for emphasis): 1. A method of making an integrated circuit, the method comprising: forming a gate stack on a semiconductor substrate; forming source and drain in the semiconductor substrate and interposed by the gate stack; forming nickel silicide features on the source and drain; forming a stressed contact etch stop layer (CESL) on the gate stack and on the semiconductor substrate, wherein the stressed CESL includes a tensile- stressed contact etch stop layer (T-CESL); forming a first dielectric material layer on the stressed CESL using a high aspect ratio process (HARP) at a deposition temperature greater than about 440°C being able to drive out a hydroxide (OH) group and less than about 480°C; forming a second dielectric material layer on the first dielectric material layer; etching to form contact holes in the first and second dielectric material layers; filling the contact holes with a conductive material; and performing a chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process. The Examiner relies on the following prior art references as evidence of unpatentability: Frohberg US 2006/0094215 A1 US 2006/0113568 A1 US2006/0160314 A1 US 2007/0212847 A1 May 4, 2006 Jun. 1, 2006 Jul. 20, 2006 Sep. 13, 2007 Chan Arghavani Ingle 2 Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 Liao Lee Wiatr Thei US 2008/0237662 A1 US 2009/0194817 A1 US 2009/0246927 A1 US 2010/0311231 A1 Oct. 2, 2008 Aug. 6, 2009 Oct. 1, 2009 Dec. 9, 2010 THE REJECTIONS 1. Claims 1 and 6-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Arghavani in view of Lee and further in view of Ingle. 2. Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Arghavani in view of Lee and further in view of Ingle as applied to claim 1 and further in view of Frohberg. 3. Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Arghavani in view of Lee and further in view of Ingle as applied to claim 4 and further in view of Liao. 4. Claims 1-4, 6-12 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Thei, in view of Lee, and further in view of Ingle. 5. Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Thei in view of Lee further in view of Ingle and further in view of Liao. 6. Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Thei in view of Lee further in view of Ingle as applied to claim 10 and further in view of Chan, and further in view of Liao. 3 Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 7. Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Thei in view of Lee and further in view of Ingle as applied to claim 10 and further in view of Wiatr. 8. Claims 21, 23, and 24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Arghavani in view of Ingle. 9. Claims 22 and 25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Arghavani in view of Ingle and further in view of Lee. 10. Claims 1, 6-12, 14, 21-25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Ingle. 11. Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Ingle, as applied to claim 1, and further in view of Frohberg. 12. Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Ingle, as applied to claim 4, and further in view of Liao. 13. Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Ingle, as applied to claim 10, further in view of Chan, and further in view of Liao. 14. Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lee in view of Ingle, as applied to claim 10, and further in view of Wiatr. 15. Claims 21, and 23-25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103(a) as being unpatentable over Thei in view of Ingle. 4 Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 16. Claim 22 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Thei in view of Ingle and further in view of Lee. ANALYSIS We select claim 1 as representative of all the claims on appeal, based upon Appellants’ presented arguments. 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c) (1) (iv) (2014). We note that our determinations made with regard to Rejection 1 is outcome determinative for Rejections 2—16 because Appellants rely upon similar arguments for all of the rejections (Appellants’ arguments pertain to the alleged deficiencies of the secondary reference of Ingle, and Ingle is applied in every rejection in the same manner). See Appeal Brief generally. We review the appealed rejections for error based upon the issues identified by Appellants and in light of the arguments and evidence produced thereon. Cf. Ex parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075 (BPAI 2010) (precedential) (cited with approval in In re Jung, 637 F.3d 1356, 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (“it has long been the Board’s practice to require an applicant to identify the alleged error in the examiner’s rejections”)). After having considered the evidence presented in this Appeal and each of Appellants’ contentions, we are not persuaded that Appellants identify reversible error, and we affirm the Examiner’s rejections for essentially the reasons expressed in the Final Office Action and the Answer. We add the following. Appellants argue that a prima facie case has not been met because the secondary reference of Ingle cannot be properly combined with the other references because Ingle does not teach “forming a first dielectric material on the stressed CESL” (Appeal Br. 15) for the reasons set forth on pages 11— 15 of the Appeal Brief. 5 Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 We agree with the Examiner’s reply made on page 8 of the Answer. Therein, the Examiner states that Arghavani discloses that a dielectric layer 208b (452) (Figure 1) is formed on a stressed CESL 208a (388). Ans. 8. The Examiner also states that Arghavani further teaches (para [0023]) the dielectric layers 208b (formed on stressed CESL) and 208d (formed in a trench) can both be formed by HARP, and thus Arghavani does not distinguish the HARP method from the different applications of forming a dielectric layer. Id. As such, the Examiner appropriately relies upon Ingle for teaching the specifics of the HARP method for forming dielectric layers, i.e., optimum temperature range (not the specific overall structure). We therefore agree with the Examiner’s statement that because there is no evidence in the record showing that HARP parameters of forming dielectric layers in trenches would not apply to forming dielectric layers on stressed CESL, especially when Arghavani does not distinguish between the HARP methods for the different dielectric layers, Appellants’ arguments are unpersuasive. Id. As such, we agree with the Examiner that aprima facie case has been met. We turn now to the rebuttal evidence presented by Appellants on pages 15—20 of the Appeal Brief. Therein, Appellants submit that the claimed temperature range achieves unexpected results, and the results are present throughout the entire claimed range. Appeal Br. 16—18. Appellants also argue that the specific unexpected results (surface roughness and nodule effects) need not be claimed. Appeal Br. 18—19. Appellants also argue that elimination of nodule effects, and avoiding transition of the nickel silicide features to a high-resistance phase, are each statistically significant. Appeal Br. 19-20. 6 Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 As stated by the Examiner on page 6 of the Final Office Action, because Ingle’s disclosed temperature range (400 to 570 °C) overlaps the claimed temperature range (>440 °C and <480 °C), aprima facie case of obviousness exists in the present case. In re Wertheim, 541 F.2d 257 (CCPA 1976); In re Woodruff 919 F.2d 1575 (Fed. Cir. 1990). Applicants can rebut a prima facie case of obviousness by showing the criticality of the claimed range. “The law is replete with cases in which the difference between the claimed invention and the prior art is some range or other variable within the claims. ... In such a situation, the applicant must show that the particular range is critical, generally by showing that the claimed range achieves unexpected results relative to the prior art range.” In re Woodruff 919 F.2d 1575 (Fed. Cir. 1990). In the instant case, as pointed out by the Examiner (Ans. 10), Appellants have not demonstrated the criticality of the temperature range. The claimed subject matter has not been compared to the closest prior art. In re Baxter Travenol Labs., 952 F.2d 388, 392, 21 USPQ2d 1281, 1285 (Fed. Cir. 1991) (“[W]hen unexpected results are used as evidence of nonobviousness, the results must be shown to be unexpected compared with the closest prior art.”). In other words, Appellants have not provided a comparison between the closest prior art1 and the claimed invention.2 Appellants refer to certain excerpts from the Specification (Appeal Br. 16—20), but no such comparison is provided. 1 As a general guideline, the closest prior art is the reference that has the most claim limitations in common with the invention, bearing in mind the relative importance of particular limitations. In re Merchant, 575 F.2d 865, 868 (CCPA 1978). 2 For example, by providing a representative number of examples of the closest prior art as comparative examples, wherein these comparative 7 Appeal 2015-002625 Application 13/212,904 We are thus in agreement with the Examiner that Appellants’ rebuttal evidence is unpersuasive. In view of the above, we affirm each rejection. DECISION Each rejection is affirmed. TIME PERIOD No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). AFFIRMED examples are compared with inventive examples by modifying a single variable of the prior art examples so the new examples fall within the scope of Appellants’ claims, in an effort to show that the inventive examples have at least one greatly improved property over that displayed by the comparative examples, and the magnitude of the improvement is clearly unexpected. 8 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation