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:
Apr. 12, 2016
Filed:
Apr. 01, 2011
Minoru Harada, Fujisawa, JP;
Ryo Nakagaki, Kawasaki, JP;
Takehiro Hirai, Ushiku, JP;
Naoki Hosoya, Tokyo, JP;
Minoru Harada, Fujisawa, JP;
Ryo Nakagaki, Kawasaki, JP;
Takehiro Hirai, Ushiku, JP;
Naoki Hosoya, Tokyo, JP;
HITACHI HIGH-TECHNOLOGIES CORPORATION, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
Disclosed is a method of inspecting an object to be inspected in a semiconductor manufacturing process, for resolving the problem to increase defect detection sensitivity. An image capture means is used to image capture a designated area of the object to be inspected; a defect is detected in the captured image; a circuit pattern is recognized from the captured image; a characteristic value is computed, relating to an image tone and shape, from the detected defect; a characteristic value is computed, relating to the image tone and shape, from the recognized circuit pattern; either a specified defect or circuit pattern is filtered and extracted from the detected defect and the recognized circuit pattern; a mapping characteristic value is determined from the characteristic value of either the filtered and extracted specified defect or circuit pattern; and the distribution of the determined characteristic values is displayed onscreen in a map format.