The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 21, 2025
Filed:
Sep. 09, 2022
Applied Materials, Inc., Santa Clara, CA (US);
Ming Hong Yang, Campbell, CA (US);
Dimitry Kouzminov, Beverly, MA (US);
Arun Ramaswamy Srivatsa, Fremont, CA (US);
Applied Materials Inc., Santa Clara, CA (US);
Abstract
Methods leverage premixed gas mixtures to perform a metrology process on a substrate using an inline secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) process. The premixed gas mixture of two or more gases is injected into a plasma chamber that is configured to produce sputtering ions for the inline SIMS process. The two or more gases produce non-metallic ion species which are compatible with downstream substrate fabrication processes and allow further fabrication to be performed on the substrate after the inline SIMS process has completed. The sputtering ions are ejected from the plasma chamber into a magnetic field. The intensity of the magnetic field is altered to select a single species of ions. The single species of ions are directed towards a surface of the substrate and secondary ions sputtered from the surface of the substrate by the selected species of ions are detected and analyzed.