Altera Corporation

Pts Corporation

Keystream Corporation

Kla Tencor Corporation

Kla-tencor Technologies Corporation

Pulsent Corporation

Edward R Ratner

Adityo Prakash

Daniel C Wack

David B Kita

Andrei Veldman

Eniko Fodor

Sachin Ahuja

Gary R Holt

Schuyler A Cullen

John Josef Hench

John Chen

Hitoshi Watanabe

David L Cook

Noah Bareket

Michael Fleisher

Oliver W Shih

Chandlee B Harrell

Carroll Philip Gossett

Tser-Yuan Brian Yang

Eniko F Prakash

Thomas D Miller

Hon Hing So

Darius John Sadri

Dimitri Antsos

Yaoming Shi

Gavin B Horn

Arthur George Chang

Schuyler Cullen

Dimitrios Antsos

Rasmus Larsen

Phil Gossett

David Cook

John S Chen

One embodiment relates to a method of model-based optical metrology. An area of a geometrical structure of dispersive materials on a substrate is illuminated with polarized incident electromagnetic radiation using an illuminator of a scatterometer apparatus. Spectral components of the incident electromagnetic radiation reflected from the area are measured using a detector of the scatterometer apparatus. Using a computer for the scatterometer apparatus, parameter values are determined that minimize an objective function which represents a difference between the measured spectral components and computed spectral components based on a parameterized model of the geometrical structure. Steps for determining the parameter values that minimize the objective function include: computing a solution to state equations driven by a function representing the incident electromagnetic radiation, and computing a solution to an adjoint to the state equations. Other embodiments and features are also disclosed.

Measuring critical dimensions of a semiconductor structure

A method for automated content insertion into a video sequence. The video sequence comprising a sequence of frames is received. An automated determination is made of non-moving pixels in the sequence of frames. Thereafter, an automated identification is made of valid regions comprising the non-moving pixels which are suitable for unobtrusive content insertion. Other embodiments, aspects and features are also disclosed.

Automated content insertion into video scene

In one embodiment, an image is broken up into multiple regions or segments, where each segment may be of arbitrary shape, and a transform (multi-scale or otherwise) is applied on the set of segments. In another embodiment, pattern adaptive prediction is used when predicting the next finer level of the transform pyramid. The pattern adaptive prediction uses the parent grid to determine what geometry of a filter is to be used when predicting the child grid. At the boundaries of the domain, the pattern adaptive prediction can coupled with the domain adaptive prediction technique.

Adaptive transforms

One embodiment relates to an automated method for estimating motion of an image segment. An image frame is segmented into irregularly-shaped image segments. Motion vectors of blocks of pixels in the image frame are estimated. A determination is made as to the blocks which overlap a segment, and candidate motion vectors are determined from the motion vectors for those overlapping blocks. A motion vector for the segment is selected from amongst the candidate motion vectors. Other embodiments, aspects, and features are also disclosed.

Automated method and apparatus for estimating motion of an image segment using motion vectors from overlapping macroblocks

One embodiment relates to a computer-implemented method for the automated extraction of objects from a video stream. The method includes an automated procedure for creating a temporal graph, and an automated procedure for cutting the graph into graph partitions. The method further includes an automated procedure for mapping the graph partitions to pixels in frames of the video stream. Other features, aspects and embodiments are also disclosed.

Computer-implemented method for object creation by partitioning of a temporal graph

One embodiment relates to a computer-implemented method of image segmentation using automated saddle point detection. An edge map is created by edge detection, and a distance map is generated based on the edge map. Saddle points are detected using the distance map. Connector pixels are determined using the saddle points, and connector pixels forming valid connecting paths are marked as edge pixels. Finally, flood filling is performed within edges to designate image segments. Other features, aspects and embodiments are also disclosed.

Computer-implemented method for efficient image segmentation using automated saddle-point detection

The present application discloses a method of model-based measurement of semiconductor device features using a scatterometer system. The method includes at least the following steps. A cost function is defined depending upon a plurality of variable parameters of the scatterometer system and upon a plurality of variable parameters for computer-implemented modeling to determine measurement results. Constraints are established for the plurality of variable parameters of the scatterometer system and for the plurality of variable parameters for the computer-implemented modeling. A computer-implemented optimization procedure is performed to determine an optimized global set of parameters, including both the variable parameters of the scatterometer system and the variable parameters for the computer-implemented modeling, which result in a minimal value of the cost function. Finally, the optimized global set of parameters is applied to configure the scatterometer system and the computer-implemented modeling. Other embodiments, features and aspects are also disclosed herein.

Method for optimizing the configuration of a scatterometry measurement system

In one embodiment, an image is broken up into multiple regions or segments, where each segment may be of arbitrary shape, and a transform (multi-scale or otherwise) is applied on the set of segments. In another embodiment, pattern adaptive prediction is used when predicting the next finer level of the transform pyramid. The pattern adaptive prediction uses the parent grid to determine what geometry of a filter is to be used when predicting the child grid. At the boundaries of the domain, the pattern adaptive prediction can be coupled with the domain adaptive prediction technique.

The present application discloses a new technique which reduces the dimensionality of a feature model by re-use of data that has been obtained by a prior measurement. The data re-used from the prior measurement may range from parameters, such as geometrical dimensions, to more complex data that describe the electromagnetic scattering function of an underlying layer (for example, a local solution of the electric field properties).

Model-based measurement of semiconductor device features with feed forward use of data for dimensionality reduction

One embodiment disclosed relates to the use of object motion estimation to interlace a progressive video sequence. One of a plurality of consecutive frames is segmented and motion vectors for each segment are determined though object motion estimation. Interpolated motion vectors are used to construct at least one intermediate frame, and interlaced fields are extracted from the new sequence of frames that includes intermediate frames. An interlaced sequence with smooth, incremental motion is thus constructed from a progressive video sequence.

Video interlacing using object motion estimation

A method and apparatus for temporally filtering a video sequence using motion compensation in which motion information captures the motion of objects is disclosed. Pixels from a current frame are aligned with matching pixels from previous and/or future frames according to the motion of the surrounding object of arbitrary shape. A weighted average of the corresponding pixels is taken for each pixel in the current frame to produce a filtered version of the current frame. The weights may be adjusted to compensate for similarities between the frames and for blur transitions near object boundaries. A lighting offset may also be used to prevent erroneous lighting shifts during filtering.

Temporal filtering using object motion estimation

In an embodiment, a method of time-domain simulation for simulating scattering spectra is described. The method may provide for computing spatial derivatives including computing spectral derivatives in some portion of the domain and finite difference derivatives in some other portion of the domain; forming an equation for non-reflecting boundary conditions; and computing a time-stepping scheme using a high-order unconditionally stable computation method.

Time-domain computation of scattering spectra for use in spectroscopic metrology

In one embodiment according to the present invention, relative z-ordering of segments in a digital image is determined. A method comprises forward and backward motion matching of image regions to determine overlap, followed by the creation of relationships (e.g., pairwise relationships) between regions and comparing the result with the original image to determine the relative z-ordering.

Method of determining relative z-ordering in an image and method of using same

One embodiment of the invention pertains to a method of determining a measure of image complexity. An image is subdivided the image into a plurality of small image regions. Multiple statistical tests are performed to determine the similarity of a pair of adjacent image regions. If said pair passes the multiple statistical tests, then the pair of adjacent image regions are grouped together into one new region. The resulting merged regions may be weighted according to geometry and/or color variance, and the weights may be summed to produce an image complexity measure.

Growing community of inventors

Los Altos, CA, United States of America

Edward R Ratner