Systems and methods for measurement of misregistration and amelioration thereof

A system for measuring misregistration of a plurality of measurement sites on a semiconductor device wafer, the system comprising:

• a misregistration metrology tool (MMT) operative to provide an MMT output relating to a measurement site being measured thereby;
• a database including a plurality of process variation (PV) categories and a corresponding plurality of parameter sets;
• and
• a process variation accommodation engine (PVAE) comprising:
• a measurement site process variation category associator (MSPVCA) operative to associate said measurement site being measured by said MMT during runtime, at least partially based on said MMT output, with a measurement site process variation category (MSPVC), said MSPVC being one of said plurality of PV categories;
• a measurement site parameter set retriever (MSPSR) operative to retrieve a measurement site parameter set (MSPS) corresponding to said MSPVC, wherein said MSPS comprises analysis algorithm parameters, and wherein said analysis algorithm parameters comprise weighting rules that determine weights for said MSPS;
• and
• a measurement site parameter set communicator (MSPSC) operative to communicate said MSPS to said MMT;
• wherein said MMT is configured to:
• measure said measurement site on a wafer based on said MSPS thereby generating said MMT output in the form of misregistration measurement data;
• and
• analyze said misregistration measurement data based on said MSPS thereby generating at least one quality metric of said measurement site, wherein said quality metric indicates at least one misregistration value for different layers between which misregistration was measured at said measurement site.

A method for measuring misregistration of a plurality of measurement sites on a semiconductor device wafer, the method comprising:

• providing a plurality of process variation (PV) categories with a corresponding plurality of parameter sets;
• generating a misregistration metrology tool (MMT) output relating to a measurement site being measured by an MMT;
• associating said measurement site being measured by said MMT during runtime, at least partially based on said MMT output, with a measurement site process variation category (MSPVC), said MSPVC being one of said plurality of PV categories;
• retrieving a measurement site parameter set (MSPS) corresponding to said MSPVC, wherein said MSPS comprises analysis algorithm parameters, and wherein said analysis algorithm parameters comprise weighting rules that determine weights for said MSPS;
• communicating said MSPS to said MMT;
• and
• measuring said measurement site with said MMT based on said MSPS thereby generating a corresponding plurality of misregistration measurement data.