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US 12,596,301 B2Granted
Reticle inspection and purging method and tool
AssigneesTaiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd., Tsmc China Company Limited
InventorsXianhui Zhou, Lei Wang, Zihao Zhang, Huiming Xu
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A reticle inspection and purging method comprises following steps. A first reticle is moved from a first load port of a lithography tool to a reticle inspection tool located outside the lithography tool. The first reticle is inspected using the reticle inspection tool located outside the lithography tool. Whether the first reticle is acceptable for exposure is determined based on the inspection result. In response the determination determines that the first reticle is not acceptable for exposure, the first reticle is purged.
Claims20
A method, comprising:
- moving, by using a robot arm, a first reticle from a first load port of a lithography tool to a reticle inspection tool located outside the lithography tool, wherein the robot arm comprises an inner fork, an outer fork, and an anti-collision bar, wherein the inner fork has a first prong and a second prong and the outer fork has a third prong and a fourth prong, wherein the first and second prongs are between the third and fourth prongs, and the anti-collision bar connects the third and fourth prongs and has a top surface higher than top surfaces of the first and second prongs;
- inspecting the first reticle using the reticle inspection tool located outside the lithography tool;
- determining whether the first reticle is acceptable for exposure based on a result of inspecting the first reticle;
- and
- in response the determination determines that the first reticle is not acceptable for exposure, purging the first reticle using a gas knife to remove contaminants from the first reticle.
2 more elements
A method, comprising:
- moving, by using a first robot arm, a first reticle from a first load port of a lithography tool to a reticle inspection tool, wherein the first robot arm comprises an inner fork, an outer fork, and an anti-collision bar, wherein the inner fork has a first prong and a second prong and the outer fork has a third prong and a fourth prong, wherein the first and second prongs are between the third and fourth prongs, and the anti-collision bar connects the third and fourth prongs and has a top surface higher than top surfaces of the first and second prongs;
- moving, by using a second robot arm, a second reticle from a second load port of the lithography tool to an exposure tool of the lithography tool;
- inspecting the first reticle using the reticle inspection tool;
- and
- during inspecting the first reticle using the reticle inspection tool, performing an exposure process on the second reticle using the exposure tool to transfer a pattern onto a semiconductor substrate.
2 more elements
A tool comprising:
- a reticle inspection tool outside a lithography tool;
- a reticle purging tool outside the lithography tool, the reticle purging tool comprising a gas knife;
- a robot arm having a range of motion sufficient to transfer a reticle between a load port of the lithography tool and the reticle inspection tool, and also sufficient to transfer the reticle between the reticle inspection tool and the reticle purging tool, wherein the robot arm comprises an inner fork, an outer fork, and an anti-collision bar, wherein the inner fork has a first prong and a second prong and the outer fork has a third prong and a fourth prong, wherein the first and second prongs are between the third and fourth prongs, and the anti-collision bar connects the third and fourth prongs and has a top surface higher than top surfaces of the first and second prongs;
- an image analyzer configured to determine whether a reticle image captured by the reticle inspection tool has an unacceptable particle condition;
- and
- a purging controller programmed to activate the gas knife of the reticle purging tool to blow particles away from the reticle, in response to a determination of the image analyzer determines that the reticle image has an unacceptable particle condition.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.