PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15894635
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-02
Publication Date: 2018-08
Patent Classification: ["438", "722000"]

Abstract:
Tin oxide films are used as spacers and hardmasks in semiconductor device manufacturing. In one method, tin oxide layer is formed conformally over sidewalls and horizontal surfaces of protruding features on a substrate. A passivation layer is then formed over tin oxide on the sidewalls, and tin oxide is then removed from the horizontal surfaces of the protruding features without being removed at the sidewalls of the protruding features. The material of the protruding features is then removed while leaving the tin oxide that resided at the sidewalls of the protruding features, thereby forming tin oxide spacers. Hydrogen-based and chlorine-based dry etch chemistries are used to selectively etch tin oxide in a presence of a variety of materials. In another method a patterned tin oxide hardmask layer is formed on a substrate by forming a patterned layer over an unpatterned tin oxide and transferring the pattern to the tin oxide.

Claim (Index 21):
The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:\n applying photoresist to the substrate; exposing the photoresist to light; patterning the photoresist and transferring the pattern to the substrate; and selectively removing the photoresist from the substrate.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 5.0
- Percentile: 88.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.33824
- Patent Class: 438.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['15195348', '14589424', '15463869', '15350911', '15855465']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.8614747674193013
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.5449452385035942
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.8298218145277306
- Mean Citation Score: 282.196544
- Max Citation Score: 400.3359
- Similarity Product: 342.0115019845605

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 0
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test