Solvent mixtures for antireflective coating compositions for photoresists

1. An antireflective coating composition, where the antireflective coating composition comprises a polymeric crosslinker and a solvent mixture, where the solvent mixture comprises at least one first organic solvent and at least one second organic solvent selected from any of structures 1, 2 and 3,

where, R 1 , R 3 , and R 4 , are independently selected from H and C 1 -C 6 alkyl, and R 2 , R 5 , R 6 , R 7 , R 8 , and R 9 are independently selected from C 1 -C 6 alkyl and n=1-5, further where the polymeric crosslinker is derived from at least one glycoluril monomer and the polymeric crosslinker is soluble in the solvent mixture.

2. The composition according to claim 1 , where the concentration of the second organic solvent is less than 25 weight % of the solvent mixture.

3. The composition according to claim 1 , where the second organic solvent is in the range of about 1 to 20 weight % of the solvent mixture.

4. The composition according to claim 1 , where the second organic solvent is in the range of about 1 to 10 weight % of the solvent mixture.

5. The composition according to claim 1 , further comprising an acid generator.

6. The composition according to claim 5 , where the acid generator is a thermal acid generator and/or photoacid generator.

7. The composition according to claim 1 , where the polymeric crosslinker absorbs radiation.

8. The composition according to claim 1 , further comprising a polymer or mixture of polymers.

9. The composition according to claim 8 , where the polymer comprises at least one moiety selected from phenolic group, hydroxy group attached to a (meth)acrylate monomeric unit, hydroxyl group attached to a vinyl ether monomeric unit, catoxylic acid or amino groups attached to a monomeric unit and an ester group.

10. The composition according to claim 8 , where the polymer is selected from a hydroxystyrene copolymer and a polyester.

11. The composition according to claim 1 , further comprising a polymer or mixture of polymers comprising an aromatic group.

12. The composition according to claim 1 , where the glycoluril monomer comprises a moiety of structure 4,

13. The composition according to claim 1 , where the polymeric crosslinker is a reaction product of a glycoluril monomer and a compound containing at least one hydroxyl or carboxyl group.

14. The composition according to claim 1 , where the first organic solvent comprises at least one solvent selected from propylene glycol monomethyl ether acetate, propylene glycol monomethyl ether, 3-ethoxypropionate, ethyl lactate and mixtures thereof.

15. A process for forming an image comprising,

a) coating and baking a substrate with the coating composition of claim 1 ;

b) coating and baking a photoresist film on top of the antireflective coating;

c) imagewise exposing the photoresist;

d) developing an image in the photoresist;

e) optionally, baking the substrate after the exposing step.

16. The process of claim 15 , where the photoresist is imagewise exposed at wavelengths between 10 nm to 450 nm.

17. The process of claim 15 , where the photoresist comprises a polymer and a photoactive compound.