In excimer laser operation, the maintenance choices by the field service engineer are critical to maximize laser performance while minimizing laser downtime, part replacement expenses, and overall touches to the instrument. To optimize maintenance choices, the engineer must estimate future internal performance of the laser, the impact of each consumable part and their interactions, the impact of operational settings and their interactions, and the optimal timing for each maintenance event. To aid engineers’ decision-making, a deep learning-based laser simulator was developed. The simulator forecasts and plots laser performance under one or multiple maintenance scenarios where each scenario may each have different maintenance timing and multiple maintenance operations such as parts replacement and other operational choices. The simulator is based on a deep recurrent neural network (RNN) with a seq2seq encoder-decoder architecture. Through the encoder, this architecture leverages model inputs that include historical laser performance and configuration data in a temporal dependence structure. Through the decoder, the architecture also captures temporally specific information about future laser operation. By adjusting the decoder inputs, the model forecasts can be altered to reflect future laser maintenance scenarios under consideration. The RNN is deployed in a software plugin for Fabscape® which provides a graphical user interface with interactive elements for field service engineers to forecast, compare maintenance operations, and compare maintenance timing on future laser performance. Ultimately, by simulating the impact of maintenance through the deep learning model and GUI, field service engineers can gain insights to enhance proactive maintenance and plan upcoming service events.
Multi-patterning techniques with ArF immersion lithography is expected to continue as main solution for manufacturing IC chips. The reduction of laser downtime has great impact on the productivity of chipmakers. The laser downtime is closely related to the lifetime of consumable parts of the laser. Gigaphoton has developed longer life excimer laser chamber which contains a new technology “New-type G-electrode”. This new type excimer laser chamber demonstrated 1.3 times longer lifetime than conventional excimer laser chamber. Gigaphoton has also introduced new design of LNM (Line Narrowing Module) last year. Through combines timing of maintenance of new type excimer laser chamber and new type LNM, it’s expected that the downtime of the laser is significantly reduced than ever. This leads to the improvement of the throughput on ArFi lithography.
Multi-patterning techniques with ArF immersion lithography is expected to continue as main solution for manufacturing IC chips. The reduction of laser downtime has great impact on the productivity of chipmakers. The laser downtime is closely related to the lifetime of consumable parts of the laser. Gigaphoton developed new laser modules, chamber and LNM (Line Narrowing Module) which have longer lifetime than current one. New chamber demonstrated 1.2 times longer lifetime than current chamber. New LNM demonstrated 1.8 times longer lifetime than current LNM. These new modules will help to reduce the downtime of the laser.
193nm ArF excimer lasers are widely used as light sources for the lithography process of semiconductor production.
193nm ArF exicmer lasers are expected to continue to be the main solution in photolithography, since advanced
lithography technologies such as multiple patterning and Self-Aligned Double Patterning (SADP) are being developed.
In order to apply these technologies to high-volume semiconductor manufacturing, the key is to reduce the total
operating cost. To reduce the total operating cost, life extension of consumable part and reduction of power consumption
are an important factor. The chamber life time and power consumption are a main factor to decide the total operating
cost. Therefore, we have developed the new technology for extension of the chamber life time and low electricity
consumption. In this paper, we will report the new technology to extend the life time of the laser chamber and to reduce
the electricity consumption.
193nm ArF excimer lasers are widely used as light sources for the lithography process of semiconductor production. At first, ArF excimer lasers have been used in semiconductor productions at the 90nm node and recently ArF excimer lasers have begun to be used for the 32nm node, by the progress in the immersion technology and the double-patterning technology. Furthermore, considering current status of development of the lithography technology using a next-generation light source, or extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light source, the start of mass production with the next-generation light source is estimated to start from 2015. Therefore, there is a need for extension of 193nm immersion lithography technology. By using the multi-patterning and double-patterning technology, design rules below limit at single exposure is possible. However, throughput is reduced due to increased lithography processes. In order to improve a decrease in throughput, a high power ArF excimer laser and larger size wafer (450mm in diameter) is needed. We have developed a new high power laser with the concept of eco-friendly. In this paper, we will introduce technologies used for our latest ArF excimer laser having tunable output power between 90W and 120W and report its performance data.
Access to the requested content is limited to institutions that have purchased or subscribe to SPIE eBooks.
You are receiving this notice because your organization may not have SPIE eBooks access.*
*Shibboleth/Open Athens users─please
sign in
to access your institution's subscriptions.
To obtain this item, you may purchase the complete book in print or electronic format on
SPIE.org.
INSTITUTIONAL Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.
PERSONAL Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.