Patent ID: 6522997
Filing Date: 2003-02-18
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
A method of stimulating a sputtering process, wherein an ejected direction of a particle from a target is designated in polar coordinates (&thgr;, &phgr;), a vertical angle &thgr; denoting an angle of said ejected direction with respect to a z-axis that is defined at an incident point of a bombarding particle on a surface plane of said target and is directed perpendicularly to said surface plane of said target and a horizontal angle &phgr; denoting an angle of an intersection line with respect to an x-axis, an xy-plane being said surface plane of the target, x-axis being an arbitrarily defined axis on said xy-plane, and said intersection line being an intersection of a plane that includes both said z-axis and said ejected direction with said xy-plane comprising:a first step of calculating a direction-dependent distribution of ejected particles from said target; a second step of dividing a range of said vertical angle &thgr; into sections of an equal interval, counting a number of the ejected particles for every section of said vertical angle &thgr;, and calculating a vertical distribution function by interpolating the counted numbers of the ejected particles as a function of said vertical angle &thgr;, a third step of determining values of said vertical angle &thgr; likely to emerge in a random process of a particle ejection from said target using said vertical distribution function as a criterion to judge whether the particle ejection at said vertical angle &thgr; is to be accepted as likely to occur or to be rejected as unlikely to occur, a fourth step of determining values of said horizontal angle &phgr; likely to emerge in a random process of a particle ejection from said target, and a fifth step of calculating tracks of sputtered particles in a sputtering arrangement using the values of said vertical angles and said horizontal angles determined by the third step and the fourth step in accordance with the Monte Carlo method.