Nano-Porous Organosilicon Ultra-Low Dielectric Constant Materials for Advanced Microelectronics Applications

Successful development of electronics-grade packaging materials with dielectric constant of or below ¿=1.5 will play a decisive role in the realization of the electronics industry road map in coming years. One of the most promising approaches toward thisgoal is the preparation of porous materials consisting of closed, nano-scaled, air-filled cells uniformly distributed within appropriate low ¿ matrix. In this SBIR, we propose to evaluate the feasibility of a recently discovered new family of dendrimers,the composition of which is especially suited for fulfilling the role of pore-generators in organosilicon matrix materials. If successful, this approach could make a decisive difference in the technical ability of future generations of microelectronic andoptoelectronic information storage technologies with huge consequences for both civilian and military applications.The opportunities of the proposed approach in the preparation of low dielectric constant materials are numerous. Primarily, they includerealistic potential for tailor-making and precise control of shapes, sizes and spatial distribution of the pores within the nano-domain of the resulting porous matrices. In addition to this, they also include opportunities for achieving generationalextendability of the dielectric constant while retaining other desired properties of the matrix and pronounced versatility of the synthetic processes providing for a variety of chemical compositions within the proposed family of dendrimer pore-generators.The latter property also suggests that different members of this dendrimer family may be applicable for different matrices.