Hitachi, Ltd.

Renesas Technology Corp.

Hitachi Automotive Systems, Ltd.

Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Hitachi-high-technologies Corporation

Hitachi Metals, Ltd.

Masatoshi Kanamaru

Yoshishige Endo

Hideyuki Aoki

Ryuji Kohno

Hideo Miura

Atsushi Hosogane

Naoto Ban

Akihiko Ariga

Takeshi Harada

Hiroya Shimizu

Tatsuya Nagata

Takanori Aono

Yoshiro Ibaraki

Toshio Miyatake

Ryuji Kono

Shinji Tanaka

Hiroyuki Ohta

Masahide Hayashi

Ryo Miyake

Takao Terayama

Masao Fukunaga

Hideo Enoki

Tamio Ishihara

Sadao Mori

Koji Saito

Katsutoshi Yamada

Makoto Kitano

Kenichi Nagae

Sadayasu Ueno

Heewon Jeong

Norio Ichikawa

Akiomi Kohno

Takeshi Araya

Masaya Horino

Hiroyuki Ota

Yuji Wada

Susumu Hioki

Teruhisa Akashi

Masashi Yura

Masaaki Namba

Takanorr Aono

Takeshi Shimano

Daisuke Maeda

Kenji Mori

Ryoji Okada

Kengo Suzuki

Katsuyoshi Terakado

Mitsuaki Haneda

Yukio Katou

Shigeru Jomura

Hiroyuki Nagatomo

Akihiro Okamoto

Kenji Kawakami

Ryuji Kouno

Yoshihige Endou

Yasuhiro Hamaguchi

To provide a physical quantity sensor having excellent reliability by reducing the influence of a force applied from the outside. Disclosed is a physical quantity sensor, which has a weight or a movable electrode formed on a device substrate, and an outer peripheral section that is disposed to surround the weight or the movable electrode, said weight or movable electrode being displaceable in the rotation direction in a plane. When the weight or the movable electrode is displaced in the rotation direction in the plane, the physical quantity sensor is provided with a rotation space at the outer peripheral section of an end portion of the weight or the movable electrode, said end portion being in the direction viewed from the center position of the weight or the movable electrode.

Physical quantity sensor

For a small sensor produced through a MEMS process, when an electrode pad, wiring, or a shield layer is formed in a final step, it is difficult to nondestructively investigate whether a structure for sensing a physical quantity has been processed satisfactorily. In the present invention, in a physical quantity sensor formed from an MEMS structure, in a structure in which a surface electrode having through wiring is formed on the surface of an electrode substrate and the periphery thereof is insulated, forming a shield layer comprising a metallic material on the surface of the electrode substrate in a planar view and providing a space for internal observation inside the shield layer makes it possible to check for internal defects.

To suppress variations of a vacuum pressure atmosphere in a physical sensor, a physical sensor in which a sensing part that measures a physical quantity is provided in a vacuum space, includes a sensor part in which a plurality of substrates are stacked, and a cavity substratehaving a space and provided on an upper surface side or a lower surface side of the sensor part by bonding, wherein the sensing part communicates with a space of the cavity substrate via a ventilation passageprovided in the sensor part.

Structure of physical sensor

There are provided a process for fabricating MEMS device that includes a plurality of through-holes capable being arranged at a high density, the through-holes having a tapered end portion. Through-holes having vertical side surfaces and tapered bottoms are provided by a processing method including the steps of: disposing quadrilateral patterning having desired dimensions on a silicon substrate having a flat surface of a crystal plane, etching the substrate to a desired depth by dry etching that can realize a high aspect ratio etching, and anisotropic wet etching the dry etched substrate with a KOH aqueous solution containing isopropyl alcohol mixed thereinto.

Process for fabricating MEMS device

A deflector array includes a plurality of deflectors, which deflect charged particle beams, arrayed on a substrate. Each of the plurality of deflectors includes a single opening formed in the substrate, and each of the plurality of deflectors includes a pair of electrodes that oppose each other through the opening and are configured to deflect a single charged particle beam. The plurality of deflectors are arrayed such that a length of the pair of electrodes in a longitudinal direction thereof is not less than a distance between centers of two of the plurality of deflectors that are located nearest to each other. The plurality of deflectors is arrayed to form a checkerboard lattice, and two openings of the two of the plurality of deflectors overlap in the longitudinal direction.

Deflector array, exposure apparatus, and device manufacturing method

A deflector array in which a plurality of deflectors, which deflect charged particle beams, are arrayed on a substrate. The plurality of deflectors include respective openings different from each other formed on the substrate. Each of the plurality of deflectors includes a pair of electrodes opposing each other through a corresponding opening, and the plurality of deflectors are arrayed such that a length of the pair of electrodes in a longitudinal direction thereof is not less than a distance between centers of two of the plurality of deflectors which are located nearest to each other.

An optical switch includes an input optical fiber, first and second output optical fibers, a movable mirror for switching over an optical path between the input optical fiber and an output optical fiber, and collimator lenses disposed on optical paths formed between the input optical fiber and the output optical fibers. When drive force is applied, the movable mirror assumes a first or second position to form an optical path between the input optical fiber and the first or second output optical fiber. When drive force is not applied to the movable mirror, an optical path is formed between the optical path in the first position and that in the second position. In the first position, a first part of the movable mirror comes in contact with a substrate. In the second position, a part of the movable mirror different from the first part comes in contact with the substrate.

Optical switch and optical switch array

In an optical head, if a lens is reduced in size so that it can be integrated with a light source and a photodetector, other optical components as well as the lens must be reduced in size, which would result in greater difficulties in handling for assembly and adjustment purposes. The invention allows large quantities of ultra-small optical heads to be produced accurately and at low cost, the optical heads being easy to adjust and not requiring the handling of minute components for adjustment purposes. A first substrate includes lenses for focusing light on an information storage medium, a second substrate includes detectors and disposed on the surface thereof, and a layer, which is disposed between the first and second substrates, includes prisms and mirrors. The layer also includes cavities in which light sources are disposed. The individual substrates are formed in the form of wafers with the lenses, mirrors, prisms, light sources, and photodetectors disposed thereon.

Optical head, optical information storage apparatus, and their fabrication method

In an electric characteristic testing process corresponding to a process of the semiconductor apparatus manufacturing processes, in order to test a large area of the electrode pad of the body to be tested in a lump, an electric characteristic testing is performed by pressing a testing structure provided with electrically independent projections having a number equal to a number of conductor portions to be tested formed on an area to be tested of a body to be tested to the body to be tested.

Method of manufacturing semiconductor apparatus

A manufacturing method for improving the yield in a semiconductor manufacturing process and reducing the manufacturing cost produces a semiconductor device that is inexpensively manufactured and has a high reliability by reliably making contact during inspection with a suitable pressing force, while limiting damage to an electrode pad even when many inspected electrodes are inspected. A substrate used for inspection of the semiconductor device has a beam, a probe on the beam having a projecting shape for coming in contact with an electrode (electrode pad) of the semiconductor device, and a secondary electrode electrically connected to the probe through an electrically conductive member disposed on the side of the beam opposed to the side where the probe is provided. In an inspecting process, an inspecting device having a layer having many projections formed in the probe come in contact with the electrode pad of the semiconductor device.

Method of manufacturing a semiconductor device including defect inspection using a semiconductor testing probe

A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device has forming process for forming a semiconductor device on a major surface of a wafer, and testing process for testing defect of the semiconductor device formed on the wafer. The testing process includes a step bringing a testing apparatus into contact with test electrodes of the semiconductor device. The testing apparatus has a contactor including a plurality of probes that come into contact with the test electrodes of the semiconductor device to be tested, and secondary electrodes electrically connected to the probes and disposed on a surface opposite to the probes; a substrate on which electrodes electrically communicated to the contactor by a conducting device. The conducting device is so formed that stress applied to the conducting device in the state where the probes are in contact with the test electrodes is larger than stress applied to the conducting device in the state where the probes are not in contact with the test electrodes.

Method of manufacturing a semiconductor device

A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device has forming process for forming a semiconductor device on a major surface of a wafer, and testing process for testing defect of the semiconductor device. The testing process includes bringing a testing apparatus into contact with test electrodes of the semiconductor device. The testing apparatus has a contactor including probes that come into contact with the test electrodes of the semiconductor device, and secondary electrodes electrically connected to the probes and disposed on a surface opposite to the probes; and a substrate on which electrodes electrically communicated to the contactor by a conducting device. The conducting device is so formed that stress applied to the conducting device in the state where the probes are in contact with the test electrodes is larger than stress applied to the conducting device in the state where the probes are not in contact with the test electrodes.

Testing apparatus for carrying out inspection of a semiconductor device

A packaging device for holding thereon a plurality of semiconductor devices to be inspected on an inspection device including a probe to be electrically connected to an electrode of each of the semiconductor devices, comprises, holes for respectively receiving detachably therein the semiconductor devices to keep a positional relationship among the semiconductor devices and a positional relationship between the packaging device and each of the semiconductor devices constant with a spacing between the semiconductor devices, in a direction perpendicular to a thickness direction of the semiconductor devices, and electrically conductive members adapted to be connected respectively to the electrodes of the semiconductor devices, and extending to an exterior of the packaging device so that the probe is connected to each of the electrically conductive members.

Packaging device for holding a plurality of semiconductor devices to be inspected

Since each wiring line is formed on one surface of the associated beam at a prescribed width over the entire length of the beam, the beam has the same sectional shape taken in the width direction at any point along an arbitrary longitudinal direction of the beam. As a result, the second moment of area, which is determined by the shapes of the beam and the wiring line, is uniform. This prevents a problem of the curvature of a beam varying locally when the beam is bent by a prescribed amount due to contact of the probe with a pad of a subject body. This, in turn, prevents local concentration of stress in the beams and thereby prevents breakage of the beam. Therefore, the probe structure can be miniaturized while the strength of the beams is kept at a required level, whereby a semiconductor device testing apparatus capable of accommodating many probes can be realized.

Semiconductor device testing apparatus and semiconductor device manufacturing method using it

A semiconductor device testing apparatus is realized, which allows contactors to be positioned throughout the wafer surface highly accurately for uniform contact, testing a large-sized wafer, and cost reduction. A plurality of divided contactor blocks is formed with a positioning groove. The groove is used to position the plurality of contactor blocks with a positioning frame. Because the contactor blocks are divided into plurals, it is less likely that a partial surface distortion affects other portions to impair surface flatness as compared with the case where a plurality of non-divided contactors is formed integrally, and the plurality of contactor blocks can be brought into contact with a wafer to be tested uniformly. Additionally, even though abnormality is generated in a part of the contactor blocks, only the part of the contactor blocks is replaced. Therefore, replacement costs can be reduced as compared with the case where a plurality of non-divided contactors is formed integrally.

Semiconductor device testing apparatus and method for manufacturing the same

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Miho, Japan

Masatoshi Kanamaru