Patent ID: 7795148

Claim:
A method of treating a dielectric film on a substrate, comprising: removing a photo-lithographic mask layer used to transfer a mask pattern to an overlying hard mask layer formed on said substrate; etching a feature in said dielectric film using said overlying hard mask layer, after said removing step; disposing said substrate having said feature etched in said dielectric film using said overlying hard mask layer in a treatment system, wherein a surface layer of said dielectric film has been exposed to an etching plasma, an ashing plasma, or a wet clean chemistry, or any combination of two or more thereof, causing damage to, or activation of, said surface layer of said dielectric film, performing a dry non-plasma removal process on said dielectric film to remove said damaged or activated surface layer, said removal process comprising: exposing said surface layer on said dielectric film to a process gas comprising HF or NH 3 or a combination thereof in order to chemically alter said surface layer; and thermally treating said chemically altered surface layer in order to desorb said chemically altered surface layer; and removing said overlying hard mask layer.