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:
Jul. 29, 1997
Filed:
Dec. 01, 1995
Raj Mohindra, Los Altos Hills, CA (US);
Abhay K Bhushan, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Rajiv Bhushan, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Suraj Puri, Los Altos, CA (US);
YieldUP International, Mountain View, CA (US);
Abstract
The invention relates to a wafer rinsing system for rinsing chemicals and particles off of wafers without introducing contaminants. The system reduces the particle count on wafers by filtering the water and the gas used during rinsing at the wet bench. The system includes a rinsing unit, a local water filter bank, a local gas filtering system, an H.sub.2 O.sub.2 injection unit, an auxiliary chemical injection unit, and a controller for operating the other components. The water filter bank provides a multiple stage filtering system to eliminate particles without a substantial drop in water pressure. The H.sub.2 O.sub.2 injection unit provides a local source of H.sub.2 O.sub.2 to clean the filter and rinser and to provide a mechanism for controlling the formation of native oxide on the wafer during rinsing. The auxiliary chemical injection unit provides a chemical additive to the rinsing unit to enhance the wafer cleaning process. The gas filtering system provides clean gas to the rinsing unit and to the injection units. The clean gas provides a clean atmosphere over the chemicals in each injection unit, and over the water in the rinser.