Hitachi-high-technologies Corporation

Hitachi, Ltd.

Adv Antest Corporation

Hitachi High-tech Corporation

Nippon Filcon Co., Limited

Kenji Obara

Takehiro Hirai

Ryo Nakagaki

Yuji Takagi

Kohei Yamaguchi

Kazuo Aoki

Yasuhiko Ozawa

Seiji Isogai

Minoru Harada

Hisae Shibuya

Toshiei Kurosaki

Naoma Ban

Toshifumi Honda

Naomasa Suzuki

Naoki Hosoya

Junko Konishi

Muneyuki Fukuda

Chie Shishido

Atsushi Miyamoto

Atsushi Shimoda

Masashi Sakamoto

Hisafumi Iwata

Norio Satou

Yoko Ikeda

Susumu Koyama

Yuuji Takagi

Kozo Miyake

Kenji Watanabe

Mitsuru Saito

Kosuke Matsumoto

Makoto Sakakibara

Noritsugu Takahashi

Tomoyasu Shojo

Sayaka Tanimoto

Hirohiko Kitsuki

Kenichi Morita

Toshiro Kubo

Yasuhiro Ozawa

Munenori Fukunishi

Takashi Nobuhara

Yoshiyuki Ikegami

Satoshi Umehara

Ryou Nakagaki

Hideka Banba

Hideka Bamba

The present disclosure provides a technique for reducing man-hour of a user required for setting an automatic focused focal point search function of an electron beam and facilitating observation of a sample when reviewing a defect using an electron microscope. The present disclosure provides a technique in a charged particle beam system, in which an appropriate focal point position search width can be automatically set in consideration of convergence accuracy and an operation time based on a focal point measure distribution width for a focal point position acquired in advance under the same conditions and a difference between focal point positions before and after automatic focused focal point position search.

Charged particle beam system, method for determining range for automatically searching for focal point position in charged particle beam device, and non-transitory storage medium recording program for causing computer system to determine range for automatically searching for focal position in charged particle beam device

The present invention provides a charged-particle radiation apparatus with a defect observation device for observing defects on a sample, the apparatus including a control unit and a display unit. The control unit is configured to execute a drift correction process on one or more images acquired with the defect observation device under a plurality of correction conditions, and display the plurality of correction conditions and a plurality of corrected images obtained through execution of the drift correction process in association with each other, as a first screen on the display unit.

Charged-particle radiation apparatus

Conventionally, there was no method for automatically selecting the layers to be overlaid, so when the number of layers to be overlaid was large, there was a problem that much time was required for selecting the layers. It is an object of the present invention to provide a defect image analysis method capable of specifying patterns and layers in which a defect occurs by overlaying defect images to be analysis targets and design layout data, and a defect image analysis system capable of improving the efficiency to select the layers from the design layout data. The present invention is characterized in dividing analysis target images for each hierarchy corresponding to a manufacturing process and generating a plurality of layers; calculating a degree of matching between each of the layer division images and each design layer of the design layout data; and specifying a design layer with a highest degree of matching of the each design layer as a design layer corresponding to the layer division image.

Defect analysis assistance device, program executed by defect analysis assistance device, and defect analysis system

A region-of-interest determination apparatus includes: a calculation unit and a region determination unit. The calculation unit calculates a degree of a defect based on at least a plurality of kinds of defect attribute information regarding defect data. The defect data includes an image corresponding to a defect position detected on a specimen by inspection thereof or an image corresponding to a defect position predicted to be likely to develop a defect on the specimen, where both images are obtained by imaging. The region determination unit extracts the defect data of which the degree is higher than a predetermined level, and determines the region to be observed or inspected on the specimen based on the extracted defect data.

Region-of-interest determination apparatus, observation tool or inspection tool, region-of-interest determination method, and observation method or inspection method using region-of-interest determination method

The present invention provides a charged particle beam device capable of automatically setting proper analysis positions for defects having various shapes. This charged particle beam device includes: an electron source for emitting an electron beam; a condenser lens for converging the electron beam emitted from the electron source; deflection means for changing a position of the electron beam converged by the condenser lens; an objective lens for constricting the electron beam changed by the deflection means so as to irradiate an inspection object therewith; a sample stage on which the inspection object is to be mounted; and defect analysis means for analyzing a defect based on information as to elements released from a defective portion of the inspection object by the irradiation with the electron beam, wherein the defect analysis means determines an analysis point based on a shape of the defect from among defect areas decided as one defect by the defect analysis means.

Charged particle beam device and method for analyzing defect therein

A charged particle beam apparatus includes a charged particle beam source which irradiates a sample with a charged particle beam, an electromagnetic lens, a lens control electric source for controlling strength of a convergence effect of the electromagnetic lens; and a phase compensation circuit which is connected to the lens control electric source in parallel with the electromagnetic lens, and controls a lens current at the time of switching the strength of the convergence effect of the electromagnetic lens such that the lens current monotonically increases or monotonically decreases.

Charged particle beam apparatus

The charged particle beam apparatus automatically judges the good or bad of an observation object on the basis of information obtained from an image of the observation object on a wafer; displays a judgment result on a screen; displays the observation object, extracted from the judgment result, that requires to be corrected on the basis of the good or bad of the observation object from a user; and corrects the judgment result to the extracted and displayed observation object on the basis of an instruction from the user.

Charged particle beam apparatus that performs image classification assistance

The present invention relates to a defect inspection apparatus based on the fact that contrasts of a grain and a void of a semiconductor copper interconnect in a scanning electron microscope are changed depending on electron beam irradiation accelerating voltages. A charged particle beam apparatus of the present invention irradiates the same portion of a specimen with electron beams at a plurality of accelerating voltages, and differentiates a grain () from a void () on the basis of a contrast change amount of the same portion in a plurality of images () acquired so as to respectively correspond to the plurality of accelerating voltages. Consequently, it is possible to automatically detect a grain and a void in a differentiation manner at a high speed without destructing a specimen.

A surface observation apparatus is achieved, which enables even a beginner to easily select an optimal evaluation indicator for each of various patterns to be evaluated without a trial and error approach. A plurality of images to be evaluated are input from an image processing unit () to an evaluation image input unit () (in step). The input images to be evaluated are displayed on a display (). A user rearranges the images in accordance with an evaluation criterion of the user while referencing the display (), and defines an evaluation criterion (in step). Evaluation values are calculated for the input images (to be evaluated) using a plurality of evaluation indicators (in step). The evaluation values for each of the evaluation indicators are compared with the evaluation criterion defined by the user, and correlation coefficients are then calculated (in step). An evaluation indicator having the maximum absolute value of a correlation coefficient is automatically selected as an evaluation criterion that is closest to the evaluation criterion defined by the user (in step). The images are rearranged in order of correlation coefficient and a list of the images is displayed on the display () so that the images are arranged in order of evaluation value (in step).

Surface observation apparatus and surface observation method

With respect to a charged particle beam device, the step size of focal point measure for executing autofocusing is optimized to a value that is optimal with respect to the spread of an approximation curve for a focal point measure distribution. The step size of focal point measure for executing autofocusing is corrected using an image feature obtained based on a layout image derived from an image obtained at a first magnification or from design data. Autofocusing is executed based on the obtained step size to carry out observation, measurement, or to image the sample under inspection.

Observation method and observation device

Provided is a charged particle beam device that prevents the increase in processing trouble caused by deterioration in the reviewing performance (e.g., overlooking of defects) by detecting an operation abnormality affecting the performance of the device or a possibility of such an abnormality in the middle of a processing sequence of a sample and giving a feedback in real time. In each processing step of the charged particle beam device, monitoring items representing the operating status of the device (control status of the electron beam, an offset amount at the time of wafer positioning, a defect coordinate error offset amount, etc.) are monitored during the processing sequence of a sample and stored as history information. In the middle of the processing sequence, a comparative judgment between the value of each monitoring item and the past history information corresponding to the monitoring item is made according to preset judgment criteria. When the width of fluctuation from the past history information deviates from a reference range, an alert is issued.

Charged particle beam device, defect observation device, and management server

Disclosed is a method for reviewing defects in a large number of samples within a short period of time through the use of a defect review apparatus. To collect defect images steadily and at high throughput, a defect detection method is selected before imaging and set up for each of review target defects in the samples in accordance with the external characteristics of the samples that are calculated from the design information about the samples. The defect images are collected after an imaging sequence is set up for the defect images and reference images in such a manner as to reduce the time required for stage movement in accordance with the defect coordinates of the samples and the selected defect detection method.

Method and apparatus for reviewing defects

Provided is a defect observation apparatus capable of analyzing a structure such as an arrangement and a vertical relationship of a circuit pattern formed by using design information of a sample, creating a non-defective product image from a defect image based on the analysis results, and detecting a defect by comparative inspection. The defect observation apparatus is provided with a computing unitwhich receives an input regarding design information of a sampleto be observed from a storage unit, receives an input regarding observable layer information previously set to the sample to be observed from the storage unitbased on the design information including one or more layers, receives an input regarding defect coordinates on the sample detected by another inspection apparatus from the storage unit, analyzes, for a defect on the sampleto be observed based on the defect coordinates, a circuit pattern structure in a peripheral area of the defect coordinates based on the design information and the layer information, estimates a non-defective product image based on the analysis result of the circuit pattern structure, and detects a defect by a comparative inspection between the non-defective product image and image information from an image obtaining unit.

Defect observation method and defect observation apparatus

A system is provided that realizes both reduction in coordinate error and improvement in throughput and allows observation of a micro-defect. The system includes: a function of measuring an amount of displacement between preliminarily calculated coordinates and an actual specimen position; a function of optimizing a coordinate correction formula so as to minimize the amount of displacement from the measured amount of displacement; and a function of calculating variation of displacement between the preliminarily calculated coordinates and the actual specimen position by statistical processing. When a value of coordinate variation is sufficiently small with respect to the field of view of an image for observation, which is to be a defect observation image, the system acquires only the image for observation without performing acquisition of an image for search, which is to be a defect search image.

Defect review system and method, and program

A method for classifying defects, including: calculating feature quantifies of defect image which is obtained by imaging a defect on a sample; classifying the defect image into a classified category by using information on the calculated feature quantities; displaying the classified defect image in a region on a display screen which is defined to the classified category; adding information on the classified category to the displayed defect image; transferring the displayed defect image which is added the information on the classified category to one of the other categories and displaying the transferred defect image in a region on the display screen which is defined to the one of the other categories; and changing information on the category.

Inspecting method, inspecting system, and method for manufacturing electronic devices

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Kawasaki, Japan

Kenji Obara