Applied Materials, Inc.

Applied Materials Israel Limited

Gilad Schwartz

Avishay Guetta

Doron Shoham

Ronen Eynat

Gal Amar

Ron Naftali

Yoram Uziel

Pavel Margulis

Israel Avneri

Natan Schlimoff

Rami Elichai

Yochanan Madmon

Igor Krayvitz (Krivts)

Igor Slobodnik

Chamber elements defining a chamber include a first element having a first surface, a second element, a first dynamic seal and load mechanism. The second element includes an outer floating element that includes a second surface about the periphery of the chamber, and an inner floating element. The second surface and the first surface are maintained proximate to each other when the chamber is in a load position and when the chamber is closed. The load mechanism may move the inner floating element from the outer floating element until a gap between the inner floating element and the second element to facilitate loading of the device to the chamber. A movement system may generate relative movement between the first element and the second element.

Chamber elements and a method for placing a chamber at a load position

Apparatus for optical inspection of a sample includes a detector assembly, which is configured to receive radiation from a focal area on the sample, and a translation mechanism, which is operative to impart motion to at least one of the detector assembly and the sample so that the focal area of the detector assembly translates over the sample along a translation path. A height sensor is positioned in a known location relative to the detector assembly so as to measure a height of the height sensor relative to a point on the sample that is ahead of the focal area by a predetermined distance along the translation path. A controller is adapted to determine an estimated height of the detector assembly, responsively to the height measured by the height sensor along the translation path.

Method and apparatus for inspecting a sample having a controller for determining an estimated height of the detector from the sample

Method and apparatus for inspecting a sample having a height measurement ahead of a focal area

In a method and apparatus for compensating for static and dynamic inaccuracies in an optical scanner used in a typical surface inspection system, the scanner may have a scanning axis and a cross-scanning axis. A surface of an inspection article is scanned along a scanning axis and a scanning axis signal is output at predetermined distances along this axis. The scanning axis signal may be used to determine a speed of relative movement between the scanner and the inspection article. A jitter signal may be output whenever the scanner deviates from the scanning axis, and this signal may be used to calculate the amount of deviation. Information, such as the speed of relative movement, scan line resolution, and a scanning axis static position error may be used to generate a scan line. A generated scan line may be shifted to compensate for a cross-scanning axis error. Utilizing this method, a scan line is generated that compensates for various scanner positioning errors, including the cross-axis and scanning axis static position errors, the scanning axis dynamic position error, and the cross-scanning axis jitter error.

Method of and apparatus for line alignment to compensate for static and dynamic inaccuracies in scanning

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Meishar, Israel

Gilad Schwartz