US Patent Issued to TAIWAN SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING on Feb. 10 for "Integrated circuit interconnect structure having discontinuous barrier layer and air gap" (Taiwanese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Feb. 11 -- United States Patent no. 12,550,699, issued on Feb. 10, was assigned to TAIWAN SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING Co. LTD. (Hsinchu, Taiwan).

"Integrated circuit interconnect structure having discontinuous barrier layer and air gap" was invented by Chin-Lung Chung (Taoyuan, Taiwan), Shin-Yi Yang (New Taipei, Taiwan) and Ming-Han Lee (Taipei, Taiwan).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A semiconductor structure includes a first dielectric layer, a first metallic feature over the first dielectric layer, an air gap over the first dielectric layer and adjacent to the first metallic feature, a second dielectric layer disposed above the air gap and on a sidewall of the first metallic...