Applied Materials, Inc.

Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

Dana L Andrews

Avi Tepman

John M White

Mei Yin Chang

Dan Maydan

Sasson Roger Somekh

David K Cheng

David N Wang

Howard E Grunes

Jerry Yuen Wong

Vladimir J Zeitlin

Kenneth R Stalder

Hiroji Hanawa

A clamping ring and temperature regulated platen for clamping a wafer to the platen and regulating the temperature of the wafer. The force of the clamping ring against the wafer is produced by the weight of the clamping ring. A roof shields all but a few contact regions of the interface between the wafer and clamp from receiving depositing particles so that a coating formed on the wafer makes continuous contact with the clamping ring in only a few narrow regions that act as conductive bridges when the depositing layer is conductive.

Method of heating and cooling a wafer during semiconductor processing

Physical vapor deposition clamping mechanism and heater/cooler

A slit valve apparatus associated with an aperture in a chamber wall through which a semiconductor wafer may be passed along a transfer plane. The apparatus is characterized by a valve seat which is angled relative to the transfer plane and a door which moves linearly along an axis substantially perpendicular to the valve seat. All frictionally engaged parts of the slit valve assembly are isolated from the interior of the chamber by a bellow sleeve to reduce the formation of particles. The method is characterized by the steps of surrounding the aperture with a first seating surface defining a sealing plane which is angularly disposed with respect to the transfer plane and engaging or disengaging a second seating surface with the first seating surface by linearly moving the second seating surface in a direction perpendicular to the sealing plane.

Slit valve apparatus and method

A magnetic field enhanced single wafer plasma etch reactor is disclosed. The features of the reactor include an electrically-controlled stepped magnetic field for providing high rate uniform etching at high pressures; temperature controlled reactor surfaces including heated anode surfaces (walls and gas manifold) and a cooled wafer supporting cathode; and a unitary wafer exchange mechanism comprising wafer lift pins which extend through the pedestal and a wafer clamp ring. The lift pins and clamp ring are moved vertically by a one-axis lift mechanism to accept the wafer from a cooperating external robot blade, clamp the wafer to the pedestal and return the wafer to the blade. The electrode cooling combines water cooling for the body of the electrode and a thermal conductivity-enhancing gas parallel-bowed interface between the wafer and electrode for keeping the wafer surface cooled despite the high power densities applied to the electrode. A gas feed-through device applies the cooling gas to the RF powered electrode without breakdown of the gas. Protective coatings/layers of materials such as quartz are provided for surfaces such as the clamp ring and gas manifold. The combination of these features provides a wide pressure regime, high etch rate, high throughput single wafer etcher which provides uniformity, directionality and selectivity at high gas pressures, operates cleanly and incorporates in-situ self-cleaning capability.

Magnetic field-enhanced plasma etch reactor

An ozone generator cell of a novel design includes a thin ceramic sheet sandwiched between a perforated metallic sheet serving as discharge electrode and a water-cooled aluminum base. Dry air or oxygen is passed over the electrode surface and a high-voltage, high-frequency electric field is applied between the electrode and the base for a corona discharge.

Ozone generator cell

Growing community of inventors

Mountain View, CA, United States of America

Dana L Andrews