Patent ID: 7544594

Claim:
A method of making a microelectronic device comprising: providing a transistor structure including a transistor gate, a diffusion layer supra-adjacent the gate, a first spacer adjacent one side of the gate and a second spacer adjacent another side of the gate; providing a protective cap super-adjacent the gate; providing contact regions super-adjacent the diffusion layer, the contact regions including a first contact region adjacent the first spacer and one side of the protective cap, and a second contact region adjacent the second spacer and an opposite side of the protective cap; and a first ILD layer encompassing the gate, the first spacer and the second spacer, and wherein providing a protective cap comprises: providing a sacrificial cap onto the gate; providing a second ILD layer encompassing the sacrificial cap super-adjacent the first ILD layer, defining a protective cap recess by removing the sacrificial cap from the second ILD layer, forming a protective cap body by providing a protective material in the protective cap recess; removing portions of the second ILD layer to provide the protective cap.