Hitachi-high-technologies Corporation

Hitachi, Ltd.

Muneo Furuse

Seiichi Watanabe

Tomoyuki Tamura

Hideyuki Yamamoto

Hitoshi Tamura

Kazuyuki Ikenaga

Tsutomu Tetsuka

Kunihiko Koroyasu

Toshio Masuda

Yoshinao Kawasaki

Motohiko Yoshigai

Masahiro Sumiya

Tetsunori Kaji

Susumu Tauchi

Saburo Kanai

Hiromichi Enami

Akitaka Makino

Toru Otsubo

Hideki Kihara

Makoto Nawata

Mitsuru Suehiro

Ichiro Sasaki

Kazuaki Ichihashi

Masanori Kadotani

Tomohiro Ohashi

Hiroshi Kanekiyo

Takahisa Hashimoto

Hiroho Kitada

Douglas M Trickett

A plasma processing apparatus is provided which includes an inert gas supply route connected to a process gas supply piping which supplies a process gas into a processing chamber in a vacuum vessel, a valve which opens or closes the inert gas supply route, and an adjuster which adjusts a flow rate of the inert gas. When processing of a sample is complete, an inert gas is supplied into the process gas supply piping so that a pressure in the process gas supply piping is maintained at a pressure higher than a pressure at which a compound of the process gas and a material of an inner wall of the process gas supply piping vaporizes.

Plasma processing apparatus and plasma processing method

The invention provides a plasma processing apparatus and a method for purging the apparatus, capable of preventing damage of components caused by pressure difference during purging operation of a vacuum reactor, and capable of preventing residual processing gas from remaining in the vacuum reactor. Inert gas is introduced through an inert gas feed porton a side wall of a depressurized processing chamber (V)of a plasma processing apparatus, and the interior of the processing chamber (V)is brought to predetermined pressure by the inert gas, and thereafter, the inert gas is supplied to processing gas supply pathsand(V) communicated to a plurality of through holesfor introducing processing gas, so as to introduce the inert gas through the plurality of through holesinto the processing chamber (V)

Plasma processing apparatus and method for operating the same

A cleaning method using a cleaning apparatus having an adhesive sheet, a conductive sheet in contact with a base material of the adhesive sheet, and a pressing member for pressing the conductive sheet onto the adhesive sheet. The pressing member includes a voltage applier, and a pressing force controller which presses the adhesive sheet onto a curved surface of a portion to be cleaned of a vacuum processing apparatus from above the conductive sheet. The method includes pressing the pressing member by a pressing force controlled via the pressing force controller to press the conductive sheet and the adhesive sheet to adhere an adhesive surface of the adhesive sheet to the curved surface of the portion to be cleaned, and applying a voltage to the conductive sheet or applying a voltage having a temporally changed polarity.

Cleaning method

The invention provides a cleaning apparatus for removing particles attached to the fine roughness on the surface of an insulating body coated on the metal surface of a vacuum processing apparatus. The present cleaning apparatus comprises an adhesive sheethaving a base materialand an adhesive surface, a conductive sheetin contact with the base material, and a pressing memberfor pressing the conductive sheetonto the adhesive sheet, a voltage applying mechanismfor applying positive or negative voltage to the conductive sheet, and a pressing force controlling mechanismfor pressing the adhesive sheetonto the curved surfaceof the vacuum processing apparatus, wherein the pressing memberpresses the conductive sheetand the adhesive sheetby a pressing force controlled via the pressing force controlling mechanismin order to closely adhere the adhesive surfaceof the adhesive sheetto the curved surface of the insulating bodyso as to remove particles attached to the insulating body, and positive or negative voltage is applied to the conductive sheetto generate electrostatic attraction force so as to attract and remove particles attached to the insulating body

Cleaning apparatus

A detection technique for detecting foreign material on the surface of a plasma processing apparatus, capable of accurately sucking/extracting and measuring foreign material contained in the measurement object surface is provided. The detection device comprises a gauge head or probe having a gas blow out opening for intermittently blowing a gas of a predetermined pressure to a measurement object surface and a gas suction opening for sucking foreign material discharged by the gas blown out from the gas blow out opening a particle counter having a suction pump for continuously sucking in a predetermined amount of gas from the gas suction opening for counting the number of foreign material particles contained in the gas sucked by the suction pump and a pressure adjustment unit for intermittently supplying gas of a predetermined pressure to the gas blowing out opening.

Device and method for detecting foreign material on the surface of plasma processing apparatus

The following plasma processing apparatus can suppress the production of contaminants from the plasma processing chamber of the apparatus and an article in the plasma processing chamber which are allowed to act as ground electrodes: a plasma processing apparatus in which a workpiece is processed by creating a plasma in the processing chamber, and one or more surfaces made of a grounded metal electric conductor which come into contact with the plasma in the plasma processing chamber are coated with a plasma-resistant polymeric material having a relationship between relative dielectric constant k&#x2208; and thickness t (&#x3bc;m) of t/k&#x2208;&#x3c;300, or a protecting layer formed of a plasma-resistant and water-absorbing resin material is adhered and fixed to the outer surface of an article in the processing chamber by its swelling and then shrinkage.

Plasma processing apparatus, protecting layer therefor and installation of protecting layer

A plasma etching method and apparatus in which a processing gas is supplied from a shower plate arranged on an electrode opposed to an electrode for generating a plasma or a sample toward the sample center, and the gas is transformed into a plasma thereby to etch the sample. RF power is applied between a sample stage and the electrode to apply the energy to charged particles in the plasma to thereby etch the sample. In the process, apart from the incidence of the charged particles to the sample, the charged particles enter also the shower plate of the electrode by application of the RF power. The charged particles entering the processing gas supply holes of the shower plate are neutralized to prevent abnormal discharge on the shower plate and consequently suppress the generation of foreign matter.

Plasma etching method

The present invention comprises an aluminum base materialconstituting the plasma processing chamber of the plasma processing apparatus, a bonding layerdeposited on the base material consisting of a transition metal or transition metal alloy that modifies the difference in thermal expansion coefficient of the base material and the material constituting a plasma contact surface, and the plasma contact surfaceformed of a material selected from a group consisting of LaO, LaAlO, MgLaAlO, and a mixture of LaOand AlObeing a metal oxide including at least La and O deposited on the bonding layervia a thermal spray process.

Method for coating internal surface of plasma processing chamber

It is required for the conventional plasma processing apparatus used for plasma processing in a reduced pressure atmosphere to replace the component parts such as earth member frequently as the expendable supplies because an insulation-processed layer and the substrate itself are thinned due to plasma and impurities contained in these thinned materials diffuse into plasma to result in adverse effect on a sample such as wafer, and thinning of the insulation-processed layer due to plasma and resultant electrical effect of the thinning of the insulation-processed layer cause the change of the state of plasma. The invention solves the problem by using electrically conductive ceramic that is formed of a baked material mainly composed of alumina for component parts of the apparatus in the plasma processing apparatus used for plasma processing of an sample to be processed such as wafer in a reduced pressure atmosphere.

Plasma processing apparatus

The present apparatus comprises a vacuum process chamber that contains an upper electrode having a conductive plate with gas supply holes for supplying a process gas and a lower electrode having a platform on which a sample is to be mounted; process gas supply means for supplying the process gas to the gas supply holes in the upper electrode and exhaust means for exhausting the vacuum process chamber; a high frequency power supply for applying a high frequency power to the upper electrode to generate a plasma between the upper and lower electrodes; a high frequency bias power supply for applying a high frequency power to the upper electrode to generate a direct current bias potential in the upper electrode; and abnormal discharge determination means for determining whether an abnormal discharge has occurred or not based on the direct current bias potential generated in the upper electrode.

Apparatus and method for monitoring plasma processing apparatus

In a plasma processing method and apparatus, microwaves are radiated from a slot antenna set at the bottom of a resonator, a plasma is generated using the microwave and a sample is processed by the plasma. A plasma having a ring-form is generated by the microwaves radiated from the slot antennas, which are disposed at an angle which is neither in parallel to nor perpendicular to a surface current flowing on a slot antenna plate. Thereby, the sample is uniformly processed.

Plasma processing method and apparatus

A coaxial passage for supplying microwaves is vertically provided over a dielectric window forming part of a processing chamber, and a conductor plate for transmitting the microwaves is arranged over the dielectric window which is positioned on the outer circumference of the coaxial passage. A microwave transmission passage can be formed between the surface of a plasma so produced as to have a critical electron density n.sub.c, and the conductor plate thereby to transmit microwaves without any reflection along the dielectric window uniformly from the center to the outer circumference.

Surface wave plasma processing apparatus

The present invention relates to a microwave plasma processing method and apparatus. According to the present invention, the microwaves are introduced into the electric discharge means in correspondence with only the traveling direction thereof, whereby uniformity in a plasma density distribution corresponding to the surface to-be-processed of the sample can be sharply enhanced, so that the sample processed by utilizing such plasma can attain an enhanced processing homogeneity within the surface to be processed. In addition, homogeneity and stability of the plasma are improved by inserting a cavity resonator between the microwave generator and plasma processing (plasma generating) chamber, and coupling the cavity resonator and plasma processing chamber such that microwaves substantially only of a desired mode (e.g., TE.sub.11) pass into the plasma processing chamber. Such coupling to provide microwaves substantially only of circular TE.sub.11 mode can be achieved by providing the coupling such that a ratio of diameter of the discharge block, where the plasma is generated, to the diameter of the cavity resonator, is 0.345.

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Kudamatsu, Japan

Muneo Furuse