PATTERN FORMING METHOD AND POSITIVE TYPE RESIST COMPOSITION

摘要

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To make it possible to suppress the exposure of a high-polymer aggregate to the side walls of patterns and to reduce line edge roughness by crosslinking the resists around the high-polymer aggregate to each other, then forming the patterns by photosensing. SOLUTION: A resist film is formed by coating application of the positive type resist composition on a substrate to be processed. A crosslinking agent disperses to the resists 2 around the high-polymer aggregate 1 and the resist film is processed under conditions under which the crosslinking agent gives rise to a crosslinking reaction. Only the resist 2 is cross-linked to form the crosslinked resist 3. The density of the resist within the high-polymer aggregate and the crosslinked resist 3 at the circumference is made uniform. When the resist film is immersed into a developer after the pattern formation by irradiation of the resist film with radiations 4, the parts irradiated with the radiations 4 dissolve. The molecules of the developer diffuse uniformly to the depth direction within the irradiated regions and dissolve successively while flatly maintaining the surface. The side walls of the patterns are, therefore, formed as the flat surfaces reflecting the irradiation intensity distribution of the radiations 4 as it is and the occurrence of the line edge roughness is averted.