Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi-high-technologies Corporation

Hitachi Displays, Ltd.

Renesas Technology Corp.

The University of Tokyo

Hitachi High-tech Electronics Engineering Co., Ltd.

Toshihiko Nakata

Sachio Uto

Masahiro Watanabe

Minoru Yoshida

Shunji Maeda

Shuichi Baba

Hiroyuki Nakano

Yasuhiro Yoshitake

Mineo Nomoto

Hiroaki Shishido

Minori Noguchi

Akira Hamamatsu

Yukihiro Shibata

Yoshitada Oshida

Yukio Kembo

Atsushi Shimoda

Takanori Ninomiya

Masataka Shiba

Shunzi Maeda

Hidetoshi Nishiyama

Yuta Urano

Takahiro Jingu

Takashi Inoue

Yoshimasa Ohshima

Kishio Hidaka

Taketo Ueno

Motoyuki Hirooka

Takehiro Tachizaki

Mutsuko Hatano

Manabu Edamura

Shinya Yamaguchi

Makoto Ohkura

Mikio Hongo

Atsushi Yoshida

Hideaki Sasazawa

Takafumi Morimoto

Toru Kurenuma

Hiroshi Yamaguchi

Toshifumi Honda

Atsushi Taniguchi

Makoto Okai

Takenori Hirose

Teruaki Tokutomi

Kaifeng Zhang

Tsuneo Nakagomi

Naoto Nakashima

Hiroshi Kuroda

Kenji Yasuda

Toshiaki Morita

Satoshi Takahashi

Nobuyuki Akiyama

Mitsuyoshi Koizumi

Kazushi Yoshimura

Takeshi Arai

Satoshi Sekino

Shinji Homma

Makiko Kohno

Tomoaki Sakata

Takahiko Suzuki

Masayoshi Serizawa

Masahiko Nakada

Hilario Haruomi Kobayashi

Maki Tanaka

Takeshi Kato

Tohru Ishitani

Akira Shimase

Asahiro Kuni

Tetsuya Matsui

Toshiyuki Nakao

Shigeki Hirasawa

Yoshimasa Oshima

Takehiko Kitamori

Junguo Xu

Kenji Furusawa

Hiroshi Toshiyoshi

Fumikazu Itoh

Kenji Nakahira

Takuya Takahashi

Yuki Shimizu

Hideo Yamakura

Takashi Kamimura

Toshio Tamura

Atsuhiro Yoshizaki

Tsuguo Sawada

Minoru Yamasaka

Yoko Saito

Shinji Honma

Kentaro Motohara

Minako Morisato

Yoshihiko Yamuchi

Takehiro Tatizaki

Shun'ichi Matsumoto

The purpose of the present invention is to increase the detection light amount of near-field light, which is generated in a liquid between a measurement probe and a sample-to-be-inspected, at the time of employing a near-field scanning microscope for measurement in a liquid, and to improve measurement reproducibility and the SN ratio of near-field light images. The present invention provides a scanning probe microscope comprising: a measurement probe that is relatively scanned over a sample-to-be-inspected; a laser beam irradiation system that irradiates the measurement probe with a laser beam; a sample cell that holds the sample-to-be-inspected and that transmits scattered light of near-field light generated between the measurement probe and the sample-to-be-inspected by the laser beam irradiation; and a detector that detects the scattered light that has passed through the sample cell.

Scanning probe microscope and sample observation method using same

An optical inspection apparatus is provided which suppresses the influence of quantum noise including: light irradiator which irradiates a sample with light; reference light emitter which emits reference light; light interference unit which generates interfering light through interference between transmitted light, scattered light, or reflected light from the sample irradiated with light by the light irradiator, and the reference light emitted by the reference light emitter; light detector which detects the interfering light generated by the light interference unit; defect identifier which identifies the presence or absence of a defect based on a detection signal obtained by the light detector detecting the interfering light; and light convertor which converts at least the state of the transmitted, scattered, or reflected light from the sample, the state of the reference light emitted by the reference light emitter, or the state of the interfering light generated by the light interference unit.

Optical inspection method and optical inspection apparatus

An optical filtering device and an optical inspection apparatus for detecting a defect in a high sensitivity using an optical filtering device which includes a shutter array formed in a two-dimensionally on an optically opaque thin film produced on a SOI wafer and the SOI wafer is removed at portions thereof on the lower side of the shutter patterns to form perforation portions while working electrodes are formed at the remaining portion of the SOI wafer, a glass substrate having electrode patterns formed on the surface thereof and having the shutter array mounted thereon, and a power supply section for supplying electric power to the electrode patterns formed on the glass substrate and the working electrodes of the SOI wafer. And the working electrodes is controlled to cause the shutter patterns to carry out opening and closing movements with respect to the perforation portions to carry out optical filtering.

Optical filtering device, defect inspection method and apparatus therefor

An internal defect inspection method where an ultrasonic wave is emitted from an ultrasonic wave transmitter toward a sample, the ultrasonic wave reflected by the sample is detected by an imaging type common-path interferometer as an interference signal, an ultrasonic wave signal is obtained from the interference signal, and any defect within the sample is detected from the ultrasonic wave signal. An internal defect inspection apparatus including an ultrasonic wave transmitter, an imaging type common-path interferometer and an ultrasonic wave signal detecting device is also provided.

Internal defect inspection method and apparatus for the same

Disclosed is a measurement method of a scanning probe microscope based upon a measurement method of a scanning probe microscope for observing a shape and an optical property of a sample by exciting near-field light, scanning relative positions of the near-field light and the sample and detecting scattered light by the sample of the near-field light and having a characteristic that the near-field light is modulated to periodically vary the relative positions of the near-field light and the sample and that a frequency of modulation applied to the near-field light and an interference signal generated at a frequency for varying the relative positions of the near-field light and the sample are selectively extracted.

Scanning probe microscope and measurement method using same

To effectively utilize the polarization property of an inspection subject for obtaining higher inspection sensitivity, for the polarization of lighting, it is necessary to observe differences in the reflection, diffraction, and scattered light from the inspection subject because of polarization by applying light having the same elevation angle and wavelength in the same direction but different polarization. According to conventional techniques, a plurality of measurements by changing polarizations is required to cause a prolonged inspection time period that is an important specification of inspection apparatuses. In this invention, a plurality of polarization states are modulated in micro areas in the lighting beam cross section, images under a plurality of polarized lighting conditions are collectively acquired by separately and simultaneously forming the scattered light from the individual micro areas in the individual pixels of a sensor, whereby inspection sensitivity and sorting and sizing accuracy are improved without reducing throughput.

Defect inspection method and apparatus therefor

In measuring the displacement of an object using the phase-shifting light interference, since three beam splitters were used for generating the four phase-shifting optical paths, an interferometer was increased in size, whereby the application objects were limited. Also, to solve an essential problem that if there is a disturbance such as a temperature distribution, a humidity distribution, an air pressure distribution, a density distribution or an air flow change on the phase-shifting optical paths, a measurement error occurs, the four phase-shifting optical paths are produced spatially in parallel by combining a four division prism with a photonic crystal &#x3bb;/4 element and a photonic crystal polarizing element arranged like an array, constructing a small light interference displacement sensor in the invention, whereby the application objects are expanded, and the microscopic displacement or surface roughness of the object can be measured at a resolution of sub nanometer or less and with high reproducibility without influence of the disturbance.

Polarizing different phases of interfered light used in a method and apparatus for measuring displacement of a specimen

In the case of measuring a pattern having a steep side wall, a probe adheres to the side wall by the van der Waals forces acting between the probe and the side wall when approaching the pattern side wall, and an error occurs in a measured profile of the side wall portion. When a pattern having a groove width almost equal to a probe diameter is measured, the probe adheres to both side walls, the probe cannot reach the groove bottom, and the groove depth cannot be measured. When the probe adheres to a pattern side wall in measurements of a microscopic high-aspect ratio pattern using an elongated probe, the probe is caused to reach the side wall bottom by detecting the adhesion of the probe to the pattern side wall, and temporarily increasing a contact force between the probe and the sample. Also, by obtaining the data of the amount of torsion of a cantilever with the shape data of the pattern, a profile error of the side wall portion by the adhesion is corrected by the obtained data of the amount of torsion.

Scanning probe microscope

A method of inspecting defects and a device inspecting defects of detecting defects at high sensitivity and high capture efficiency even on various patterns existing on a wafer. In the device of inspecting defects, an illumination optical system is formed of two systems of a coherent illumination of a laserand an incoherent illumination of LEDsand, and light paths are divided in a detecting system corresponding to respective illumination light, spatial modulation elementsandare arranged to detecting light paths, respectively, scattered light inhibiting sensitivity is shielded by the spatial modulating elementsand, scattered light transmitted through the spatial modulation elementsandis detected by image sensorsandarranged to respective light paths, and images detected by these two image sensorsandare subjected to a comparison processing, thereby determining a defect candidate.

Method of defect inspection and device of defect inspection

In a method and an apparatus for inspecting a thermally assisted magnetic recording head element, a specimen is mounted on a table movable in a plane of a scanning probe microscope device, evanescent light is generated from a portion of light emission of evanescent light of the specimen, scattered light of the evanescent light is detected by moving the table in the plane while a cantilever of the scanning probe microscope having a probe is vertically vibrated in the vicinity of a surface of the specimen, and an intensity distribution of the evanescent light emitted from the portion of light emission of evanescent light or a surface profile of the portion of light emission of evanescent light of the specimen is inspected using position information of generation of the evanescent light based on the detected scattered light.

Thermally assisted magnetic recording head inspection method and apparatus

There is provided a pattern inspection device for a substrate surface which can inspect a substrate including a pattern whose size is equal to or smaller than light resolution limit at high speed. The pattern inspection device for the substrate surface includes: a near-field optical headhaving a fine repetitive pattern; a &#x3b8; driving unitof scanning an inspected substraterelatively to the near-field optical head; a space holding mechanism of holding a space between the near-field optical headand the inspected substrateconstant; alight sourceof irradiating light to the near-field optical head; a detection systemof detecting an intensity of scattered light generated by interaction between the fine repetitive pattern on the near-field optical headand a fine pattern on a surface of the inspected substrate; and a signal processing unitof inspecting the fine pattern on the inspected substratebased on an output of the detection system

Pattern inspection device of substrate surface and pattern inspection method of the same

To detect both of near-field light and magnetic field generated by a thermal assist type magnetic head and to perform inspection of the head, a cantilever of a scanning probe microscope has a lever in which a probe is formed, a thin magnetic film formed on a surface of the probe, and fine particles or thin film of noble metal or an alloy including noble metal formed on a surface of the magnetic film. An inspection apparatus has the cantilever, a displacement detection unit to detect vibration of the cantilever, a near-field light detection unit to detect scattered light caused by near-field light generated from a near-field light emitter and enhanced on the surface of the probe of the cantilever, and a processing unit to process signals obtained by detection with the displacement detection unit and the near-field light detection unit.

Cantilever of scanning probe microscope and method for manufacturing the same, method for inspecting thermal assist type magnetic head device and its apparatus

In a near-field scanning microscope using an aperture probe, the upper limit of the aperture formation is at most several ten nm in practice. In a near-field scanning microscope using a scatter probe, the resolution ability is limited to at most several ten nm because of the external illuminating light serving as background noise. Moreover, measurement reproducibility is seriously lowered by a damage or abrasion of a probe. Optical data and unevenness data of the surface of a sample can be measured at a nm-order resolution ability and a high reproducibility while damaging neither the probe nor the sample by fabricating a plasmon-enhanced near-field probe having a nm-order optical resolution ability by combining a nm-order cylindrical structure with nm-order microparticles and repeatedly moving the probe toward the sample and away therefrom at a low contact force at individual measurement points on the sample.

Scanning probe microscope and sample observing method using the same

A defect inspecting method is provided which comprises a pre-scan defect inspecting process including a pre-scan irradiating step for casting irradiation light onto the surface of a sample, a pre-scan detecting step for detecting the scattered lights, and a pre-scan defect information collecting step for obtaining information on preselected defects present on the sample surface on the basis of the scattered lights; a near-field defect inspecting process including a near-field irradiating step in which the distance between the sample surface and a near-field head is adjusted so that the sample surface is irradiated, a near-field detecting step for detecting near-field light response, and a near-field defect information collecting step for obtaining information on the preselected defects on the basis of the near-field light response; and a merging process for inspecting defects present on the sample surface by merging the pieces of information on the preselected defects.

Method and device for inspecting for defects

In a displacement measurement apparatus using light interference, a probe light path is spatially separated from a reference light path. Therefore, when a temperature or refractive index distribution by a fluctuation of air or the like, or a mechanical vibration is generated, an optical path difference fluctuates between both of the optical paths, and a measurement error is generated. In the solution, an optical axis of probe light is brought close to that of reference light by a distance which is not influenced by any disturbance, a sample is irradiated with the probe light, a reference surface is irradiated with the reference light, reflected light beams are allowed to interfere with each other, and a displacement of the sample is obtained from the resultant interference light to thereby prevent the measurement error from being generated by the fluctuation of the optical path difference.

Method and apparatus for measuring displacement of a sample using a wire grid polarizer to generate interference light

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Hiratsuka, Japan

Toshihiko Nakata