PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15877219
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-01
Publication Date: 2019-07
Patent Classification: ["257", "316000"]

Abstract:
A three-dimensional memory device includes semiconductor devices located on a semiconductor substrate, lower interconnect level dielectric layers embedding lower interconnect structures, an alternating stack of insulating layers and electrically conductive layers overlying the lower interconnect level dielectric layers and including stepped surfaces, memory stack structures vertically extending through the alternating stack, and contact via structures extending downward from the stepped surfaces through underlying portions of the alternating stack to the lower interconnect structures. Each of the contact via structures laterally contacts an electrically conductive layer located at the stepped surfaces, and provides electrical interconnection to an underlying semiconductor device. A top portion of each contact via structures contacts an electrically conductive layer, and is electrically isolated from other underlying electrically conductive layers.

Claim (Index 18):
The method of  claim 13 , wherein:\n the stepped surfaces continuously extend from a bottommost layer within the alternating stack to a topmost layer within the alternating stack; the method further comprises forming a retro-stepped dielectric material portion over the stepped surfaces in the word line contact region; each electrically conductive layer within the alternating stack contacts a respective one of the contact via structures; the method further comprises forming upper interconnect structures over the memory stack structures after formation of the electrically conductive layers; and an entire region of the retro-stepped dielectric material portion within an area of the stepped surfaces is free of any conductive via structure after formation of the upper interconnect structures.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 26.0
- Percentile: 86.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.29825
- Patent Class: 257.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: none
- Component Type: 0
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['15489050', '15269294', '15632983', '15269041', '15638672']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.9481456846140476
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.5543343369396085
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.9087645498466036
- Mean Citation Score: 437.393132
- Max Citation Score: 450.66562000000016
- Similarity Product: 317.2878546457732

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

Dataset: test