Patent ID: 7578946

Claim:
A plasma processing method for performing plasma processing by using a plasma processing system comprising a chamber for housing a substrate-to-be-processed; a belljar disposed on the chamber in communication with the chamber and having a side wall and a top wall of an insulator; a conducting mount disposed in the chamber, for the substrate-to-be-processed to be mounted on; an antenna means disposed on the outside of the side wall of the belljar, for generating induced electromagnetic fields in the belljar; a first high-frequency electric power source for supplying high-frequency electric power to the antenna means; gas supply means for supplying a plasma generating gas which is dissociated by the induced electromagnetic fields generated by the antenna means to be plasmas, and a processing gas for the plasma processing; a conducting member disposed upper of the top wall, opposed to the mount, and being permanently grounded; and a second high-frequency electric power source for supplying high-frequency electric power to the mount, high-frequency electric power being supplied from the second high-frequency electric power source to the mount to generate electric fields between the mount and the conducting member and to ignite plasmas based on only the high frequency power from said mount to said grounded conducting member, after ignition is achieved with said second high-frequency electric power source, high-frequency electric power being supplied from the first high-frequency electric power source to the antenna means is initiated to generate induced electromagnetic fields in the belljar and generate inductive coupled plasmas, and then, the second high-frequency electric power source being stopped from supplying high-frequency electric power to the mount after the first high-frequency electric power source has started the supply of the high-frequency electric power to the antenna means so that high-frequency electric power is supplied only to the antenna means, whereby the plasma processing is made on the substrate-to-be-processed, and wherein the plasma processing is carried out at a process chamber pressure of 0.1 to 100 mTorr.