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. 03, 2007
Filed:
Oct. 18, 2005
Bernhard R. Liegl, Cold Spring, NY (US);
Colin J. Brodsky, Salt Point, NY (US);
Scott J. Bukofsky, Hopewell Junction, NY (US);
Steven J. Holmes, Guilderland, NY (US);
Bernhard R. Liegl, Cold Spring, NY (US);
Colin J. Brodsky, Salt Point, NY (US);
Scott J. Bukofsky, Hopewell Junction, NY (US);
Steven J. Holmes, Guilderland, NY (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A method and apparatus are provided for improving the leveling and, consequently, the focusing of a substrate such as a wafer during the photolithography imaging procedure of a semiconductor manufacturing process. The invention performs a pre-scan of the wafer's topography and assigns importance values to different regions of the wafer surface. Exposure focus instructions are calculated based on the topography and importance values of the different regions and the wafer is then scanned and imaged based on the calculated exposure focus instructions.