Sumitomo Metal Industries, Inc.

Sumimoto Metal Indsutries, Ltd.

Toshihiro Hayami

Hiroyuki Tanaka

Toshiyuki Nakamura

Toshiya Miyazaki

Tadao Nakatsuka

Hiroshi Mabuchi

Katsuo Katayama

Naohiko Takeda

Tomomi Murakami

Junya Tsuyuguchi

Hideo Ida

Shigeki Honda

Minoru Yamada

A method for detecting an etching endpoint and a plasma etching apparatus and a plasma etching system using such a device are disclosed, in which time series data of a signal corresponding to the amount of light of the plasma light generated during the plasma etching process are arithmetically processed, so that the change of light amount is corrected and an etching endpoint is detected from the time series data after the correction.

Method for detecting etching endpoint, and etching apparatus and etching system using the method thereof

Etching apparatus and etching system using the method thereof

The plasma processing apparatus and plasma processing method of the present invention are suitable for the application of plasma processing to etching, ashing, CVD, etc. in the manufacturing of large scale integrated circuits (LSIs) and liquid crystal display panels (LCDs), and useful for the manufacturing of LSIs and LCDs. The apparatus is characterized in that the reaction chamber has its side wall separated into an inner side wall which faces to the interior of the reaction chamber and an outer side wall which faces to the exterior of the reaction chamber, with the inner side wall being isolated electrically from other portions of the reaction chamber and not grounded electrically. This structure improves the repeatability of plasma processing. The apparatus is also characterized in that the inner side wall of reaction chamber is isolated thermally from other portions of the reaction chamber and equipped with temperature control means. This structure improves the temperature control performance for the inner side wall and also improves the maintainability of the apparatus.

Plasma processing apparatus and plasma processing method

Plasma processing apparatus utilizing a microwave window having a

Method for detecting etching endpoint, and etching apparatus and etching

A plasma processing apparatus comprises a reaction chamber, an upper electrode, a lower electrode which confronts the upper electrode and also functions as a sample stage, means of supplying RF power between the upper electrode and lower electrode such that the RF power is supplied to one of the upper and lower electrodes, with another electrode and the reaction chamber being grounded, and RF impedance matching means, wherein the capacitance between the grounded electrode and the reaction chamber is 125 pF or less. The apparatus is capable of stabilizing the plasma generation and alleviating the occurrence of sudden deterioration of the repeatability of plasma processing and unequal performance of plasma processing among individual apparatus. The apparatus can be applied suitably to etching apparatus having small electrode spacing and using a chlorine compound gas or a bromine compound gas such as Cl.sub.2 or HBr.

Plasma processing apparatus

Method for detecting etching endpoint and etching apparatus and etching

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Nishinomiya, Japan

Toshihiro Hayami