STMicroelectronics

About: STMicroelectronics is a company organization based out in Geneva, Switzerland. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Transistor & Signal. The organization has 17172 authors who have published 29543 publications receiving 300766 citations. The organization is also known as: SGS-Thomson & STM.

Method of forming submicron contacts and vias in an integrated circuit

Abstract: A method is provided of forming a small geometry via or contact of a semiconductor integrated circuit, and an integrated circuit formed according to the same, is disclosed. According to a first disclosed embodiment, an opening is formed partially through an insulating layer overlying a conductive region. Sidewall spacers are formed along the sidewalls of the opening. The remaining insulating layer is etched to expose the underlying conductive region. The contact dimension of the opening is smaller than the opening which can be printed from modern photolithography techniques. According to an alternate embodiment, the opening in the insulating layer expose the underlying conductive region. A polysilicon layer is formed over the insulating layer and in the opening. The polysilicon is oxidized to form a thick oxide in the opening and is etched back to form oxidized polysilicon sidewall spacers which decrease the contact dimension of the opening. According to a further alternate embodiment, an etch stop layer is formed between the insulating layer and conductive region and an opening is formed in the insulating layer exposing the etch stop layer. A sidewall spacer film is formed over the insulating layer and the etch stop layer, both layers having a similar etch rate for a given etchant. The etch stop and spacer layers are etched in the opening to expose the underlying conductive layer thereby forming a contiguous sidewall spacer and etch stop layer on the sides of and under the insulating layer, thereby decreasing the contact dimension of the opening.

New Achievements on CVD Based Methods for SiC Epitaxial Growth

Abstract: The results of a new epitaxial process using an industrial 6x2” wafer reactor with the introduction of HCl during the growth have been reported. A complete reduction of silicon nucleation in the gas phase has been observed even for high silicon dilution parameters (Si/H2>0.05) and an increase of the growth rate until about 20 µm/h has been measured. No difference has been observed in terms of defects, doping uniformity (average maximum variation 8%) and thickness uniformity (average maximum variation 1.2 %) with respect to the standard process without HCl.

Voltage multiplier for high output current with stabilized output voltage

Abstract: A voltage multiplier for relatively high output current has its design output voltage stabilized and rendered independent of process spread, temperature, supply voltage and output current level, by a stabilization loop driving the switch that cyclically connects to ground a charge transfer capacitance of the functional voltage multiplier circuit. The feedback loop comprises an integrating stage, stabilized by creating a low-frequency zero in the transfer function for compensating one of two low-frequency poles of the transfer function of the whole circuit.

An ASIC design for a high speed implementation of the hash function SHA-256 (384, 512)

Abstract: An implementation of the hash functions SHA-256, 384 and 512 is presented, obtaining a high clock rate through a reduction of the critical path length, both in the Expander and in the Compressor of the hash scheme. The critical path is shown to be the smallest achievable. Synthesis results show that the new scheme can reach a clock rate well exceeding 1 GHz using a 0.13um technology.

Method of generating successions of pseudo-random bits or numbers

Abstract: A method for generating a succession of pseudo-random numbers includes choosing at least one chaotic map, and choosing a seed for the chaotic map and a number of iterations for the chaotic map. The succession of pseudo-random numbers are generated by executing iteratively generating a pseudo-random number as a function of a final state reached by the chaotic map iterated for the current number of iterations starting from the current seed, and generating a new seed for the chaotic map or a new number of iterations as a function of the final state.