Displacement based overlay or alignment

    公开(公告)号:US10852646B2

    公开(公告)日:2020-12-01

    申请号:US16300314

    申请日:2017-04-20

    Abstract: A method including obtaining an image of a plurality of structures on a substrate, wherein each of the plurality of structures is formed onto the substrate by transferring a corresponding pattern of a design layout; obtaining, from the image, a displacement for each of the structures with respect to a reference point for that structure; and assigning each of the structures into one of a plurality of groups based on the displacement.

    Method of predicting patterning defects caused by overlay error

    公开(公告)号:US10712672B2

    公开(公告)日:2020-07-14

    申请号:US16315026

    申请日:2017-07-07

    Abstract: A method including determining a first color pattern and a second color pattern associated with a hot spot of a design layout pattern, the design layout pattern configured for transfer to a substrate, and predicting, by a hardware computer system, whether there would be a defect at the hot spot on the substrate caused by overlay error, based at least in part on a measurement of an overlay error between the first color pattern and the second color pattern.

    Identification of hot spots or defects by machine learning

    公开(公告)号:US11443083B2

    公开(公告)日:2022-09-13

    申请号:US16300380

    申请日:2017-04-20

    Abstract: Methods of identifying a hot spot from a design layout or of predicting whether a pattern in a design layout is defective, using a machine learning model. An example method disclosed herein includes obtaining sets of one or more characteristics of performance of hot spots, respectively, under a plurality of process conditions, respectively, in a device manufacturing process; determining, for each of the process conditions, for each of the hot spots, based on the one or more characteristics under that process condition, whether that hot spot is defective; obtaining a characteristic of each of the process conditions; obtaining a characteristic of each of the hot spots; and training a machine learning model using a training set including the characteristic of one of the process conditions, the characteristic of one of the hot spots, and whether that hot spot is defective under that process condition.

    Optimizing a sequence of processes for manufacturing of product units

    公开(公告)号:US11442367B2

    公开(公告)日:2022-09-13

    申请号:US17411107

    申请日:2021-08-25

    Abstract: A method for optimizing a sequence of processes for manufacturing of product units, includes: associating measurement results of performance parameters (e.g., fingerprints) with the recorded process characteristics (e.g., context); obtaining a characteristic (e.g., context) of a previous process (e.g. deposition) in the sequence already performed on a product unit; obtaining a characteristic (e.g., context) of a subsequent process (e.g., exposure) in the sequence to be performed on the product unit; determining a predicted performance parameter (e.g., fingerprint) of the product unit associated with the sequence of previous and subsequent processes by using the obtained characteristics to retrieve measurement results of the performance parameters (e.g., fingerprints) corresponding to the recorded characteristics; and determining corrections to be applied to future processes (e.g. exposure, etch) in the sequence to be performed on the product unit, based on the determined predicted performance parameter.

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