Int J Adv Manuf Technol DOI 10.1007/s00170-017-0060-4 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Study on diamond dressing for non-uniformity of pad surface topography in CMP process Chao-Chang A. Chen 1 · Quoc-Phong Pham 2 Received: 27 July 2016 / Accepted: 16 January 2017 © Springer-Verlag London 2017 Abstract Diamond dressing process is critical in condi- tioning pad surface topography before and after chemical mechanical planarization/polishing (CMP) process for inte- grated circuit (IC) fabrication. This paper addresses a kine- matic model of diamond dressing effect on the profile of pad cutting rate (PCR) with a ring-type diamond dresser through both simulation and experiments. In this kinematic model, the cutting locus distribution, relative velocity of dia- mond grits on a pad surface, and sliding time have been described as significant factors for non-uniformity of pad surface topography. Moreover, the speed ratio between the diamond dresser and the polishing pad has been investi- gated with respect to the center distance of the pad and the diamond dresser by the developed method. The model has been verified by experiments of diamond dressing of pad. Experimental results show that the dressing marks and pad cutting rate on the pad surface follow the same trend as simulation results and the final pad surface is obtained as a  Chao-Chang A. Chen artchen@mail.ntust.edu.tw Quoc-Phong Pham phongpham@tvu.edu.vn 1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taiwan University ofScience and Technology, Taipei 106, Taiwan 2 School ofEngineering and Technology, Tra Vinh University, Tra Vinh, Vietnam concave shape. Results of this study can be applied on dia- mond dressing of pads used in CMP and furthermore can be extended to investigate an optimal diamond dressing process for semiconductor fabrication. Keywords Diamond dressing · Pad cutting rate · Kinematic model · Cutting locus density · CMP 1 Introduction The diamond dressing process plays a key role in gener- ating the pad surface topography before and after chem- ical mechanical planarization/polishing (CMP) process by recovering roughness of pad surface and removing debris and residual slurry grits on the pad surface [1, 2]. In the dressing process, the pad surface topography can be affected by dressing force, dressing velocity, and dressing time of diamond dresser. The diamond dressing process can be con- sidered as a diamond grinding process on the polishing pad. Most polishing pads now are made of polyurethane (PU) or non-woven fibers. Due to the non-uniformity of diamond dressing factors, the pad topography is always not uniform and that strongly affects the performance of CMP in semi- conductor fabrication. Many researchers proved that soft pad asperities wear and deformation appears during CMP process can cause surface topography changes of the pad [3, 4]. Non-uniformity of pad surface topography affects the contact area and friction force between pad and wafer surface [5–7]. A correlation between pad surface roughness and material removal rate (MRR) of the wafer has been sur- veyed [8–11]. Therefore, control of flatten pad topography