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US 6,602,348 B1Granted
Substrate cooldown chamber
AssigneeApplied Materials, Inc.
InventorTerrance R. Rogelstad
Life of this patent
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AssigneeApplied Materials, Inc.
InventorTerrance R. Rogelstad
Estimating the term…
The present invention provides a cooldown chamber allowing more efficient and rapid cooling of a substrate. The substrate is cooled in the cooldown chamber utilizing a pair of cooling members, preferably mating “clam shell” style members, positioned adjacent the top and bottom surfaces of the substrate. While the top surface of the substrate should not be contacted directly, the upper cooling member can approach the substrate surface, preferably to within about 0.01 to about 0.03 inches. The bottom cooling member should also approach the bottom substrate surface, preferably making contact or being within about 0.01 to about 0.03 inches. With the cooling members closed to define an enclosure around a hot substrate, an inert gas is supplied into the enclosure at pressures between about 5 and about 30 torr to allow efficient thermal conduction from the substrate to the cooling members. After the substrate has been given a sufficient amount of time to cool, the cooling members are separated and the high pressure gas within the enclosure is allowed to escape and diffuse into the gases occupying the remaining volume of the cooldown chamber.
A cooldown chamber comprising:
A cluster tool having a buffer chamber separating individual processing chambers, the cluster tool comprising:
A method for operating a high pressure cooldown chamber on a cluster tool having a low pressure transfer chamber, comprising the steps of:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.