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:
Jun. 03, 2003
Filed:
Feb. 03, 2000
Bryon K. Hance, Austin, TX (US);
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Abstract
Methods and apparatus for inspecting a feature on a wafer surface are provided. In one aspect a method of inspecting a feature on a film surface is provided that includes illuminating the feature with laser radiation and detecting radiation scattered from the feature with a plurality of detectors. Each of the plurality of detectors has a known position. A position of the feature observed by each of the plurality detectors is computed based upon the radiation scattered from the feature. An average position of the positions observed by each of the plurality of detectors is computed. A first value for each of the plurality of detectors is computed that is the scalar product of the known position of a given detector with the difference of the position of the feature observed by that given detector and the average of the positions observed by each of the plurality of detectors. A second value or scatter height descriptor indicative of the topography of the feature is computed by summing first values for the plurality of detectors.