Polishing platen equipped with guard ring for chemical mechanical polishing
AssigneeTaiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd.
InventorTsu Shih
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A polishing pad platen that is equipped with a guard ring, or a slurry retaining collar, used in chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) for conserving usage of polishing slurry is described. A method for conserving slurry solution during a CMP process is further described. In the novel polishing pad platen, a guard ring is mounted to the platen by sealiningly engaging an outer periphery of the platen for preventing spilling out of slurry solution during a polishing operation. The guard ring is mounted to slidingly engage the platen in such a way that the ring may be lowered to be completely out of the way during a pad condition process in which the spinning out of a pad conditioning solution from a top surface of the polishing pad is necessary.
Claims12
A polishing platen equipped with a guard ring used in chemical mechanical polishing for conserving usage of polishing slurry comprising:
- a rotatable platen of circular shape supported by a shaft;
- a polishing pad mounted on the rotatable platen;
- a guard ring having a preset height of at least 1 cm sealingly engaging an outer periphery of said platen for preventing spilling out of slurry solution during a polishing operation;
- and
- electrical means for slidingly engaging and moving up-and-down said guard ring on said outer periphery of said platen, in such a way that when the guard ring is in a down position said guard ring is at the same level with the polishing pad.
A polishing pad platen for use in a slurry polishing process comprising:
- a rotatable platen for rotating on a motor driven shaft;
- a rotating pad mounted on said rotatable platen;
- and
- a slurry retaining collar slidingly engaging a periphery of said polishing pad for preventing spilling out of slurry solutions during a polishing process, said slurry retaining collar being movable in an up-and-down motion on said platen by an electrical means in such a way that when the guard ring is in a down position said guard ring is at the same level with the polishing pad.
A method for conserving slurry solution during a chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process comprising the steps of:
- providing a rotatable platen supported on a motor driven shaft;
- mounting a polishing pad on said rotatable platen;
- mounting a guard ring on an outer periphery of said rotatable platen in a sliding engagement allowing upward and downward movement of said guard ring by electrical means for sealingly engaging a periphery of said polishing pad;
- and
- conducting a CMP process on an electronic substrate and preventing spilling out of a slurry solution from said top surface of the polishing pad.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.