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. 06, 2010
Filed:
Nov. 13, 2008
Kazuhiro Ueda, Kawagoe, JP;
Akio Yoneyama, Kawagoe, JP;
Kazuhiro Ueda, Kawagoe, JP;
Akio Yoneyama, Kawagoe, JP;
Hitachi, Ltd., Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
Provided is a thin film stack inspection method capable of accurately measuring and inspecting layer thicknesses of thin film stacks. An X-ray having a long coherence length is used as an incident X-ray and the X-ray specular-reflected from a sample placed on a goniometer is partially bent by a prism. The X-ray bent by the prism and the X-ray going straight are made to interfere with each other to obtain interference patterns. Though being thin film stacks, the sample has a portion having no thin film and thus an exposed substrate. The X-ray not bent by the prism includes an X-ray specular-reflected from the exposed substrate. By changing the incident angle from 0.01° to 1°, the interference patterns of the specular-reflected X-ray are measured. Thus, layer thicknesses are measured using a change in a phase of the X-ray reflected from a film stack interface.