Automated fabrication of e-beam masks

Andreas B. Oelmann

doi:10.1117/12.3012001

12 October 2023 Automated fabrication of e-beam masks

Andreas B. Oelmann

Proceedings Volume 12812, Bay Area Chrome Users Society Symposium 1988; 128120F (2023) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3012001
Event: 8th Annual BACUS Symposium, 1988, Sunnyvale, CA, United States

Abstract

Masks should have and reticles for wafer steppers have to have zero defects. Despite of all repair possibilities the defect generation during the fabrication process has to be minimized to reach short turn around times and economical feasable mask prices. As most of the defects are generated by particles and a large share of the particles is generated by humans it is possible to reduce defects by special clean room adapted automation. A detailed evaluation of the mask fabrication process shows that it is most important to avoid particles until the chrome is etched because from then on cleaning of the mask is possible. Therefore the e-beam mask facility at Siemens in Munich has been fully automated from blank loading into the e-beam system until chrome etching including all handling- and transport- steps and cd-measurements: - For loading and unloading of mask-blanks into holders and magazines of the e-beam system a precision clean room robot with 6 axes is used. This "preparation cell" includes automatic defect inspection of the resist surface. - The "e-beam writing cell" is equipped with an identical robot as before for loading and unloading the e-beam system with magazines. The processing line for resist development, baking, plasma descumming and chrome etching is directly accessed by the robot of the "preparation cell". Mask handling and transport in this line is performed by four handling systems each serving one process system and one automatic microscope for cd-measurement. The process line is an expert system: According to the result of the cd-measurement a rework or variation of the following process parameters is initiated if necessary. The whole system is connected to a CAM-system by SECS interfaces.

Citation Download Citation

Andreas B. Oelmann "Automated fabrication of e-beam masks", Proc. SPIE 12812, Bay Area Chrome Users Society Symposium 1988, 128120F (12 October 2023); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3012001

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