Ex Parte Goda et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Apr 24, 2017

13450299 (P.T.A.B. Apr. 24, 2017)

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.
13/450,299 04/18/2012 Akira Goda 303.D66US1 9946
73115 7590 04/26/2017
SCHWEGMAN LUNDBERG & WOESSNER/MICRON
P.O. BOX 2938
MINNEAPOLIS, MN 55402
EXAMINER
GONDARENKO, NATALIA A
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2891
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
04/26/2017 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):
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SLW @blackhillsip.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte AKIRA GODA and ROGER W. LINDSAY
Appeal 2016-001152
Application 13/450,299
Technology Center 2800
Before ADRIENE LEPIANE HANLON, TERRY J. OWENS, and
MONTE T. SQUIRE, Administrative Patent Judges.
OWENS, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’
rejection of claims 11, 13—22 and 25—31. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
The Invention
The Appellants claim a method which, the Appellants state
(Spec. 1 8), can form a memory device. Claim 11 is illustrative:
11. A method, comprising:
forming a first deck having a number of first levels of
conductor material and a number of first levels of dielectric
material over a substrate, each level of the number of first levels
of conductor material being separated from an adjacent level of
conductor material by at least one of the number of first levels of
dielectric material;
Appeal 2016-001152
Application 13/450,299
forming a first set of openings through the number of first
levels of conductor material and the number of first levels of
dielectric material;
forming a sacrificial material in the first set of openings,
the sacrificial material at least partially filling the first set of
openings;
forming a second deck over the first deck, the second deck
having a number of second levels of conductor material and a
number of second levels of dielectric material, each level of the
number of second levels of conductor material being separated
from an adjacent level of conductor material by at least one of
the number of second levels of dielectric material;
forming a second set of openings through the number of
second levels of conductor material and the number of second
levels of dielectric material, each of the second set of openings
being substantially vertically aligned with respective ones of the
first set of openings, the second set of openings not having a
sacrificial material formed therein at any temporal point during
formation of either the first deck or the second deck, the second
deck comprising memory devices;
removing the sacrificial material from the first set of
openings, forming multi-deck openings through the first deck
and the second deck; and
forming silicide substantially concurrently on exposed
areas of the first levels of conductor material and the second
levels of conductor material within at least some of the multi­
deck openings.
The References
Sakaguchi
Son (Son ’966)
Kidoh
Omura
US 2009/0230449 A1
US 2009/0242966 A1
US 2010/0109072 A1
US 2010/0176440 A1
US 2010/0240205 A1
US 2011/0151667 A1
US 2011/0233646 A1
US 2011/0309430 A1
Sep. 17, 2009
Oct. 1, 2009
May 6, 2010
July 15,2010
Sep. 23,2010
June 23, 2011
Sep. 29, 2011
Dec. 22, 2011
Son (Son ’205)
Hwang
Mizushima
Purayath
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Appeal 2016-001152
Application 13/450,299
The Rejections
The claims stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as follows:
1) claim 11 over Hwang in view of Kidoh and Son ’966,
2) claims 11 and 13—15 over Omura in view of Hwang,
Kidoh and Son ’966,
3) claims 11,13 and 14 over Kidoh in view of
Mizushima and Son ’966,
4) claims 16 and 17 over Omura in view of Hwang,
Kidoh, Son ’966 and Son ’205,
5) claims 18—21 over Omura in view of Mizushima,
Son ’205, Son ’966 and Kidoh,
6) claims 18—21 and 30 over Kidoh in view of Son ’205
and Son ’966,
7) claim 22 over Kidoh in view of Son ’205, Son ’966
and Sakaguchi,
8) claim 22 over Omura in view of Mizushima, Son ’205,
Son ’966 and Sakaguchi,
9) claims 25—27 over Omura in view of Mizushima,
Son ’966 and Kidoh,
10) claim 28 over Omura in view of Mizushima,
Son ’966 and Son ’205,
11) claim 29 over Hwang in view of Purayath,
12) claim 30 over Omura in view of Mizushima,
Son ’205, Son ’966 and Kidoh, and
13) claim 31 over Kidoh in view of Purayath, Mizushima
and Son ’205.
OPINION
We reverse rejections 1, 3, 6, 7, 11 and 13 and affirm rejections 2, 4,
5, 8—10 and 12.
Rejections 1 and 3
We need address only the sole independent claim in rejections 1
and 3, i.e., claim 11. That claim requires forming a first set of openings
through a first deck’s levels of conductor material, forming a sacrificial
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Application 13/450,299
material in the first set of openings, and forming a second set of openings
through a second deck’s levels of conductor material such that the second set
of openings does not have a sacrificial material formed therein at any
temporal point during formation of either the first deck or the second deck.
To meet that claim requirement the Examiner relies upon Kidoh’s
paragraph 12 which describes an aspect of the invention without mentioning
a sacrificial material in the openings of a second deck (stacked body ML2;
Fig. 8A) (Final Act. 4, 13).
Kidoh discloses, with respect to a first embodiment, that openings in a
second deck (MF2) are filled with a sacrificial member (53) (Tflf 52, 58;
Fig. 9A), and Kidoh describes the other embodiments as differing from the
first embodiment in ways unrelated to the sacrificial member (|| 72, 75, 76,
78, 81, 82—86, 88, 90). Thus, the Examiner’s finding that Kidoh forms
second deck openings not having a sacrificial material therein at any
temporal point during formation of the first or second deck is not supported
by Kidoh’s disclosure.
The Appellants’ claim 11 also requires “forming silicide substantially
concurrently on exposed areas of the first levels of conductor material and
the second levels of conductor material within at least some of the
multi-deck openings.”
Son ’966 discloses a nonvolatile memory device wherein, in a gap
between insulation interlayer patterns (104), a low resistance metal silicide
pattern (162) word line contacts a control gate pattern (131a)’s surface such
that the operating speed of the device may be increased (Tflf 215, 221;
Fig. 33).
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Application 13/450,299
The Examiner concludes that Son ’966 would have suggested forming
metal silicide substantially concurrently on Kidoh’s first deck’s and second
deck’s levels of conductor material to increase the device’s operating speed
(Final Act. 14; Ans. 5).
“A rejection based on section 103 clearly must rest on a factual basis,
and these facts must be interpreted without hindsight reconstruction of the
invention from the prior art.” In re Warner, 379 F.2d 1011, 1017 (CCPA
1967).
The increased operating speed benefit relied upon by the Examiner is
a characteristic of Son ’966’s device. The Examiner does not address the
differences between Kidoh’s and Son ’966’s devices and establish that,
regardless of those differences, one of ordinary skill in the art would have
been motivated to modify Kidoh’s device as proposed by the Examiner and
would have had a reasonable expectation that the modified device would
have the relied-upon beneficial characteristic of Son ’966’s device. See In re
Vaeck, 947 F.2d 488, 493 (Fed. Cir. 1991); In reOTarrell, 853 F.2d 894,
902 (Fed. Cir. 1988).
Rejections 6 and 7
We need address only the sole independent claim in rejections 6
and 7, i.e., claim 18. That claim requires substantially concurrently
removing a portion of a first charge-storing material and a second
charge-storing material so as to be substantially coplanar with sidewalls of a
multi-deck channel opening to form a number of discrete charge storage
structures in first and second decks. To meet that claim requirement the
Examiner relies upon Son ’205 (Final Act. 24—25).
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Application 13/450,299
Son ’205 forms a nonvolatile memory device by a method comprising
forming openings (134) through a stack of alternating insulating layers (110)
and conductive layers (LSL, WL, USL) by removing a portion of a buried
conductive layer (151) and a first insulating layer (141), oxidizing the buried
conductive layer (151)’s exposed surface to form floating gates (FGs)
comprising buried conductive patterns (152), and then forming
semiconductor pillars (PL) in the openings (134) (H 50, 80—85; Figs. 4, 14-
lb).
The Examiner concludes that it would have been obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art to modify Kidoh’s device by “substantially
concurrently removing a portion of the first charge-storage material and the
second charge-storage material so as to be substantially co-planar with
sidewalls of the multi-deck channel opening to form a number of discrete
charge storage structures in the first and second decks in order to provide a
nonvolatile memory device comprising floating gates interposed between
sides of the semiconductor pillars and the word lines, and thus, to obtain [a]
three-dimensional device having excellent reliability (Son (’205), 10005,
10050)” (Final Act. 25).
The excellent reliability benefit relied upon by the Examiner is a
characteristic of Son ’205’s device. The Examiner does not address the
differences between Kidoh’s and Son ’205’s devices and establish that,
regardless of those differences, one of ordinary skill in the art would have
been motivated to modify Kidoh’s device as proposed by the Examiner and
would have had a reasonable expectation that the modified device would
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Application 13/450,299
have the relied-upon beneficial characteristic of Son ’205 ’s device. See
Vaeck, 947 F.2d at 493; O’Farrell, 853 F.2d at 902.1
Rejections 11 and 13
The Appellants’ claims 29 and 31 require forming a sacrificial
material fully within a first gate-slit opening, the sacrificial material partially
filling the first gate-slit opening and being formed over an air gap located
proximal to a substrate and within the first gate-slit opening.
Hwang makes a nonvolatile memory device by a method comprising
forming lower deck (100) sacrificial patterns (165) which are removed to
form a trench (320) (H 155, 156, 161—164; Figs. 14—17).
Purayath makes a nonvolatile memory device by a method comprising
applying a capping layer (484) over and between stacks such that word line
air gaps (486) are formed between the stacks (H 66—67; Figs. 70). The air
gaps provide electrical isolation or shielding between adjacent stacks (1 66).
The Examiner concludes that it would have been obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art to form Hwang’s sacrificial material (165) over an
air gap “to provide electrical isolation or shielding between elements of
adjacent layer stack rows, and thus to provide high density semiconductor
device, such as non-volatile storage (Purayath, 10003,10066)” (Final
Act. 39).
The Examiner does not establish that one of ordinary skill in the art
would have considered Purayath’s disclosed benefit of the word line air
1 Also, as with claim 1 l’s silicide-forming step, the Examiner does not
establish that Son ’966 would have provided one of ordinary skill in the art
with an apparent reason to modify Kidoh’s method such that it includes that
step in claim 18’s method.
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Application 13/450,299
gaps, i.e., electrical isolation or shielding between adjacent layer stack rows
(1 66), to be applicable to Hwang’s sacrificial layer (165) which is removed
during formation of the device (| 163). The Examiner, therefore, has not set
forth a factual basis which is sufficient to support a prima facie case of
obviousness of the methods claimed in the Appellants’ claims 29 and 31.
See Warner, 379 F.2d at 1017.
For the above reasons we reverse rejections 1, 3, 6, 7, 11 and 13.
Rejections 2, 4, 5, 8—10 and 12
The Appellants state that “[a] 1 though the undersigned does not admit
that Omura or Mizushima teach or suggest any of the claim elements, the
undersigned will instead focus on the misapplication of the cited references
to Hwang, Kidoh, and Son 1 [i.e., Son ’966]” (Br. 21). The Appellants do
not challenge rejections 2, 4, 5, 8—10 and 12. Accordingly, we summarily
affirm those rejections.
DECISION/ORDER
Rejections 1, 3, 6, 7, 11 and 13 are reversed and rejections 2, 4, 5, 8—
10 and 12 are affirmed.
It is ordered that the Examiner’s decision is affirmed-in-part.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a).
AFFIRMED-IN-PART
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