公开(公告)号：US09223307B1

公开(公告)日：2015-12-29

申请号：US14639980

申请日：2015-03-05

Applicant: Macau University of Science and Technology

Inventor： Naiqi Wu ,  Fajun Yang ,  Yan Qiao ,  MengChu Zhou

IPC: G06F19/00 ,  G05B19/418 ,  B25J9/00 ,  G06F17/50

CPC classification number: G05B19/41865 ,  B25J9/009 ,  G05B2219/32245 ,  G05B2219/45032 ,  G06F17/5013 ,  H01L21/67745

Abstract: In semiconductor manufacturing, there are wafer fabrication processes in cluster tools that need a wafer to visit some processing steps for more than once, leading to a revisiting process. Also, wafers may be subject to wafer residency time constraints. By considering atomic layer deposition (ALD) as a typical wafer revisiting process, this invention studies the challenging scheduling problem of single-arm cluster tools for the ALD process with wafer residency time constraints. By recognizing that the key to this problem is to schedule the robot tasks, the present invention presents different robot task sequencing strategies. With these strategies for different cases, the present invention performs the schedulability analysis and derives the schedulability conditions for such tools for the first time. If schedulable, the present invention proposes scheduling algorithms to obtain an optimal schedule efficiently. Illustrative examples are given to show the application of the proposed concepts and approach.

Abstract translation: 在半导体制造中，在集群工具中存在晶片制造工艺，其需要晶片多次访问一些处理步骤，导致重新审视过程。 此外，晶片可能受到晶片驻留时间限制。 通过考虑原子层沉积（ALD）作为典型的晶片再访问过程，本发明研究了具有晶圆驻留时间约束的ALD工艺的单臂簇工具的具有挑战性的调度问题。 通过认识到这个问题的关键是计划机器人任务，本发明提出了不同的机器人任务排序策略。 利用这些针对不同情况的策略，本发明首次执行可调度性分析并得出这些工具的可调度条件。 如果可调度，本发明提出调度算法以有效地获得最佳调度。 给出说明性的例子来说明所提出的概念和方法的应用。