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:
May. 05, 2015
Filed:
May. 09, 2011
Masashi Hayashi, Tokyo, JP;
Masashi Hayashi, Tokyo, JP;
SUMCO Corporation, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
It is an object to obtain an image of a wafer that is suitable for a defect inspection in an efficient manner. It is judged whether or not an average gray level of an image of a wafer W that is an inspection target and that has been imaged by the light receiving partis in the defect detectable range. A control processing partis configured to modify an exposure time in imaging the wafer W and to obtain an image of the wafer W again by the light receiving partin the case in which it is decided that an average gray level of an image of the wafer W is not in a defect detectable range, and an image processing partis configured to carry out a defect inspection based on an image of the wafer W in the case in which it is decided that an average gray level of the image of the wafer W is in the defect detectable range.