Inspection apparatus for inspecting patterns of substrate
AssigneeHitachi High-Technologies Corporation
InventorsKoichi Hayakawa, Masaaki Nojiri
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A degradation in throughput is prevented even in cases where it is necessary to reduce a pixel size during inspection according to a finer circuit pattern. In an inspection method and an inspection apparatus in which an inspected sample having a circuit pattern is irradiated with a charged particle beam to generate a signal, an image is obtained from the signal, and in which a defect of the circuit pattern is detected from the image, the inspection is performed while an inspected pixel size in a direction in which the charged particle beam is scanned relative to the inspected sample and an inspected pixel size in a stage moving direction are separately set. The stage is moved while the inspected sample is placed thereon.
Claims6
A circuit pattern inspection apparatus comprising:
- irradiation means for irradiating a sample with a charged particle beam, a circuit pattern being formed in the sample;
- scanning means for scanning the sample with the charged particle beam in an X-direction;
- stage moving means for moving a stage, on which the sample is placed, in a Y-direction, the Y-direction being different from the X-direction;
- detection means for detecting a signal, the signal being generated from the sample by the irradiation with the charged particle beam;
- memory means for storing an image of the circuit pattern in the sample, the image being obtained from the signal detected by the detection means;
- comparison means for comparing the image stored in the memory means with an image obtained from another circuit pattern corresponding to the circuit pattern in the sample;
- determination means for determining a defect on the circuit pattern from the comparison result performed by the comparison means;
- and
- setting means for setting each of a pixel size in the X-direction and a pixel size in the Y-direction separately from, and independently of, each other, when the sample is moved in the Y-direction by the stage moving means and is scanned in the X-direction by the scanning means, the pixel size in the X-direction corresponding to the signal detection interval in the X-direction on the sample, the pixel size in the Y-direction corresponding to the signal detection interval in the Y-direction on the sample.
A circuit pattern inspection method comprising:
- irradiating a sample in which a circuit pattern is formed with a charged particle beam to scan the sample in an X-direction for generating a signal from the sample,
- imaging the signal to obtain an image of the circuit pattern in the sample,
- comparing the image with an image obtained from another circuit pattern corresponding to the circuit pattern in the sample, and
- determining a defect on the circuit pattern is made based on the comparison result, wherein:
- a pixel size in the X-direction and a pixel size in the Y-direction are set separately from, and independently of, each other, the Y-direction being different from the X-direction, when the sample is moved in the Y-direction and is scanned in the X-direction,
- the pixel size in the X-direction corresponds to the signal detection interval in the X-direction on the sample, and
- the pixel size in the Y-direction corresponds to the signal detection interval in the Y-direction on the sample.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.