Kla Tencor Corporation

Kla Corporation

3dv Systems Ltd.

Other

Microsoft International Holdings B.v.

Kla Corporation Ca

Amnon Manassen

Andrew V Hill

Vladimir Levinski

Daria Negri

Ohad Bachar

Daniel Kandel

Yuri Paskover

Avi Abramov

Andrei V Shchegrov

Barak Bringoltz

Joel L Seligson

Alexander Svizher

Gilad Laredo

Liran Yerushalmi

Ilan Sela

Yoram Uziel

Eran Amit

Nuriel Amir

Yuval Lubashevsky

Barry Loevsky

Yossi Simon

Yonatan Vaknin

Mark Ghinovker

Roie Volkovich

Noam Sapiens

Anna Golotsvan

Yoel Feler

Nadav Gutman

Avner Safrani

Nireekshan K Reddy

Moshe Markowitz

Efraim Rotem

Giora Yahav

Yung-Ho Alex Chuang

Michael E Adel

Zeev Bomzon

Lawrence D Rotter

Eitan Hajaj

Nir BenDavid

Yoni Shalibo

Ofer Zaharan

Ady Levy

Ilya Bezel

Stilian Pandev

Anatoly Shchemelinin

Allen Park

Guy Cohen

Yoav Grauer

Gregory Brady

Derrick A Shaughnessy

Tzahi Grunzweig

Muzammil A Arain

Dimitry Sanko

Amit Shaked

Boris Efraty

Sharon Aharon

Antonio Mani

Nadav Carmel

Ido Adam

Gavriel Joseph Iddan

David Lee Brown

David Y Wang

Mark Davis Smith

John Charles Robinson

Ori J Braun

Frank Laske

Amir Widmann

Meir Aloni

Boris Golovanevsky

Raviv Yohanan

Jonathan M Madsen

Johannes D De Veer

Tal Marciano

Pradeep Subrahmanyan

Roel Gronheid

DongSub Choi

Dana Klein

Itay Gdor

Tal Itzkovich

William Pierson

Evgeni Gurevich

Myungjun Lee

Andy Hill

Inna Tarshish-Shapir

Guy Ben Dov

Diana Shaphirov

Dongsub Choi

Einat Peled

Anatoly Vasiliev

Asaf Granot

Tal Yaziv

Nimrod Shuall

Lilach Saltoun

Chen Dror

Anat Marchelli

Noga Sella

Dror Alumot

Tom Leviant

Ariel Hildesheim

An overlay metrology system may include an illumination an illumination source to generate an illumination beam, one or more illumination optics to direct the illumination beam to an overlay target on a sample as the sample is scanned relative to the illumination beam along a scan direction, the target including one or more cells having Moiré structures. The system may also include two photodetectors at locations of a pupil plane associated with Moiré or overlapping diffraction orders from the Moiré structures. The system may then generate overlay measurements based on time-varying interference signals captured by the detector as the sample is scanned.

Scanning scatterometry overlay metrology

An overlay metrology system may include an illumination source to generate illumination including two or more spectral bands having two or more center wavelengths. The system may include an optical sub-system to illuminate and image a sample, where the sample in accordance with the metrology recipe includes one or more cells with grating-over-grating structures formed as overlapping gratings with different pitches in different sample layers. The system may include collection pupil components to exclusively pass, for each of the two or more center wavelengths, two diffraction lobes from each of the different pitches of the grating-over-grating structures. A controller may receive images of the sample from the detectors generated in accordance with the metrology recipe and generate overlay measurements between at least some of the different layers of the sample based on the images.

Grating-over-grating overlay measurement with parallel color per layer

A multi-column metrology tool may include two or more measurement columns distributed along a column direction, where the two or more measurement columns simultaneously probe two or more measurement regions on a sample including metrology targets. A measurement column may include an illumination sub-system to direct illumination to the sample, a collection sub-system including a collection lens to collect measurement signals from the sample and direct it to one or more detectors, and a column-positioning sub-system to adjust a position of the collection lens. A measurement region of a measurement column may be defined by a field of view of the collection lens and a range of the positioning system in the lateral plane. The tool may further include a sample-positioning sub-system to scan the sample along a scan path different than the column direction to position metrology targets within the measurement regions of the measurement columns for measurements.

Massive overlay metrology sampling with multiple measurement columns

Systems and methods for generating volumetric data are disclosed. Such systems and methods may include scanning a sample at a plurality of focal planes located along a depth direction of the sample. Such systems and methods may include generating, via a detector of a metrology sub-system, a plurality of images of a volumetric field of view of the sample at the plurality of focal planes. Such systems and methods may include aggregating the plurality of images to generate volumetric data of the volumetric field of view of the sample. The metrology sub-system may include a Linnik interferometer.

3D profilometry with a Linnik interferometer

An overlay metrology target may include grating-over-grating structures formed from a lower grating structure with a first coarse pitch in a first sample layer and an upper grating structure with a second coarse pitch in a second sample layer, where the upper and lower grating structures overlap on the sample. At least one of the upper grating structure or the lower grating structure may include features with a fine pitch smaller than a wavelength of an illumination beam and arranged to rotate first-order diffraction of the illumination beam associated with at least one of the first or second coarse pitches with respect to at least one of specular reflection from a top surface of the sample or zero-order diffraction from the one or more grating structures. Overlay between the first and second layers of the sample is determinable from an image of the grating structures based on the first-order diffraction.

Scatterometry overlay metrology with orthogonal fine-pitch segmentation

An overlay metrology system may include illumination optics to split illumination from an illumination source into primary and secondary illumination and direct the primary illumination to a sample including an overlay target with gratings in two or more layers and an objective lens to collect positive and negative diffraction from the constituent gratings. The system may further include collection optics to overlap the auxiliary illumination with at least some of the collected diffraction lobes to generate time-varying interference signals. The system may further include a controller to generate overlay measurements based on the time-varying interference signals.

Scanning overlay metrology with high signal to noise ratio

A system for use with a misregistration metrology tool (MMT), the system including a database including a plurality of process variation (PV) categories and a corresponding plurality of parameter sets and a process variation accommodation engine (PVAE) including a measurement site process variation category associator (MSPVCA) operative to associate a measurement site being measured by the MMT, at least partially based on an MMT output relating to the measurement site, with a measurement site process variation category (MSPVC), the MSPVC being one of the plurality of PV categories, a measurement site parameter set retriever (MSPSR) operative to retrieve a measurement site parameter set (MSPS) corresponding to the MSPVC and a measurement site parameter set communicator (MSPSC) operative to communicate the MSPS to the MMT.

Systems and methods for measurement of misregistration and amelioration thereof

A method for correcting misregistration measurements of a semiconductor wafer for errors therein arising from tilt of the wafer including measuring, for at least one location on a wafer, a difference between a Tool Induced Shift (TIS) of a metrology device in a first illumination arrangement with respect to the wafer wherein a surface of the wafer is generally orthogonally illuminated by an illumination source of the metrology device and a TIS of the metrology device in a second illumination arrangement with respect to the wafer, wherein the surface is obliquely illuminated by the illumination source, and correcting a misregistration measurement measured by the metrology device at the at least one location for errors therein arising from tilt of the wafer at the location by subtracting from the misregistration measurement a weighted value of the difference between the TIS in the first and second illumination arrangements.

Systems and methods for correction of impact of wafer tilt on misregistration measurements

An adaptive modeling method for generating misregistration data for a semiconductor device wafer (SDW) including calculating a fitting function for a group of SDWs (GSDW) having units, including measuring an SDW in said GSDW, thereby generating test data sets corresponding to the units, removing non-unit-specific values (NUSVs) from the test data sets, thereby generating cleaned test data sets, and analyzing the cleaned test data sets, thereby generating the fitting function, and generating misregistration data for at least one additional SDW (ASDW) in the GSDW, including measuring the ASDW, thereby generating run data sets, removing NUSVs from the run data sets, thereby generating cleaned run data sets, fitting each of the cleaned run data sets to the fitting function, thereby generating coefficient sets, and calculating misregistration data for the ASDW, at least partially based on the fitting function and the coefficient sets.

Adaptive modeling misregistration measurement system and method

A system and method for generating a quality parameter value of a semiconductor device wafer (SDW), during fabrication thereof, the method including designating a plurality of measurement site sets (MSSs) on the SDW, each of the MSSs including a first measurement-orientation site (FMS) and a second measurement-orientation site (SMS), the FMS and the SMS being different measurement sites on the SDW, generating a first measurement-orientation quality parameter dataset (FMQPD) by measuring features formed within each the FMS of at least one of the MSSs in a first measurement orientation, generating a second measurement-orientation quality parameter dataset (SMQPD) by measuring features formed within each the SMS of the at least one of the MSSs in a second measurement orientation and generating at least one tool-induced-shift (TIS)-ameliorated quality parameter value (TAQPV), at least partially based on the FMQPD and the SMQPD.

Systems and methods for improved metrology for semiconductor device wafers

An optical metrology tool may include one or more illumination sources to generate illumination having wavelengths both within a short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral range and outside the SWIR spectral range, illumination optics configured to direct the illumination to a sample, a first imaging channel including a first detector configured to image the sample based on a first wavelength range including at least some wavelengths in the SWIR spectral range, a second imaging channel including a second detector configured to image the sample based on a second wavelength range including at least some wavelengths outside the SWIR spectral range, and a controller. The controller may receive first images of the sample from the first detector, receive second images of the sample from the second detector, and generate an optical metrology measurement of the sample based on the first and second images.

Optical metrology utilizing short-wave infrared wavelengths

A system and method are disclosed for generating metrology measurements with second sub-system such as an optical sub-system. The method may include performing a training and a run-time operation. The training may include receiving first metrology data for device features from the first metrology sub-system (e.g., optical); generating first metrology measurements (e.g., critical dimensions, etc.); binning the device features into two or more device bins based on the first metrology measurements; and identifying representative metrology targets for the two or more device bins based on distributions of the first metrology measurements. The run-time operation may include receiving run-time metrology data (e.g., optical) of the representative metrology targets; and generating run-time metrology measurements based on the run-time metrology data.

Device feature specific edge placement error (EPE)

A metrology system may arrange metrology measurements for a plurality of metrology targets distributed in a plurality of fields on one or samples into a signal vector, where the metrology measurements associated with the metrology targets in each of the plurality of fields are grouped within the signal vector. The system may further decompose the signal vector into reconstruction vectors associated with different spectral components of the signal vector. The system may further classify a subset of the reconstruction vectors as components of a metrology model, where a sum of the components corresponds to a metrology model describing the metrology measurements on the one or more samples. The system may further generate control signals to control one or more processing tools based on the metrology model.

Universal metrology model

An overlay metrology system may include an objective lens, illumination optics to illuminate an overlay target including a first grating with a first pitch on a first sample layer and a second grating with a second pitch on a second sample layer, where the first and second sample layers are separated by a layer separation distance greater than a depth of field of the objective lens. The system may further include collection optics with a radially-varying defocus distribution to compensate for the layer separation distance such that the first and second gratings are simultaneously in focus on the detector.

Single grab overlay measurement of tall targets

An overlay metrology system may include illumination sources configured to generate one or more pairs of mutually coherent illumination beams and illumination optics to direct the pairs of illumination beams to an overlay target at common altitude incidence angles and symmetrically opposed azimuthal incidence angles, where the overlay target includes two or more grating structures distributed along one or more measurement directions. The system may further include imaging optics to image the overlay target onto detectors when implementing the metrology recipe, where an image of a particular one of the two or more grating structures is generated exclusively with a single non-zero diffraction order of light from each of the illumination beams within the particular one of the pairs of illumination beams. The system may further include a controller to determine overlay measurements based on images of the overlay target.

Imaging overlay with mutually coherent oblique illumination

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Haifa, Israel

Amnon Manassen