Patent ID: 7361444

Claim:
A method comprising: disposing on a surface, a layer of polymeric resin material, said layer of polymeric resin material having a thickness of between about 1000 Å and 10000 Å and comprising an optically tuned planarizing layer, said tuned layer having an index of refraction layer (n) from about 1.4 to about 2.1, and an extinction coefficient (k) from about 0.1 to 0.6 at 365, 248 193 and 157 nm, said polymeric resin being selected from the group consisting of novolac/diazonapthoquinone resin, polysulfones, polyhydroxystyrene based materials, polyimide materials cast from solvents substantially free of amines, and blends thereof, said resin containing a covalently bonded chromophore used to modulate the optical properties of said material and a variety of wavelengths; a polyfunctionalized crosslinking agent selected from the group consisting of mono-, di-, multi hydroxy substituted methylphenols, aminoplasts, urea resins, glycoluril resins, melamines; and a thermal acid generator comprising compounds that undergo catastrophic decomposition at a given threshold temperature that results in the formation of one or more molecules of a strong acid; disposing on said layer of polymeric resin material, a layer of resist material containing photosensitive elements; said layer of polymeric resin material having a crosslink density sufficiently high that said polymeric resin material and said resist material do not substantially intermix; said layer of polymeric resin material being thicker than said layer of resist material, and forming a multilayer resist structure exhibiting sub 200 nm resolution, said multilayer resist comprising a first layer having a thickness of between about 1000A and 4000A on a second layer having a thickness between about 1000 A and 3.0 μm.