TWI771695B - Claw, air lock chamber and host platform of plasma processing device - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention provides a support claw, an air lock chamber and a host platform of a plasma processing device. The pair of two support claw contacts with the edge part of the wafer to support the wafer; the support claw includes soft wear-resistant material, which is soft and wear-resistant. Material is placed on the jaws to reduce or avoid particles generated when the wafer comes into contact with the jaws. The invention realizes the soft contact between the support claw and the wafer by arranging the soft wear-resistant material on the support claw, effectively avoiding the friction caused by the hard contact between the wafer and the support claw, thereby preventing the generation of particles and greatly reducing the wafer consumption. defect rate.

Description

Claw, air lock chamber and host platform of plasma processing device

The invention relates to the field of semiconductor manufacturing, in particular to a holding claw, an air lock chamber and a host platform of a plasma processing device.

Particle contamination is often found in wafer transport paths within existing plasma processing apparatuses. Particle contamination is one of the important indicators to measure the performance of plasma processing equipment. Particles falling on the wafer can cause process defects and even lead to the waste of the wafer.

In particular, the claws for placing wafers in the loadlock are one of the main sources of contamination of particles. Airlocks are used in plasma processing apparatus host platforms to provide unprocessed wafers to and receive processed wafers from a plurality of process modules. The air lock chamber has a cavity structure and is connected with a transfer module. Each air lock chamber is provided with a plurality of claws for placing wafers.

As shown in FIG. 1 and FIG. 5, the reason for particle contamination in the air lock chamber 20 is that both the ceramic claws 22 and the wafer 10 are very hard and brittle, and the friction or collision between the wafer 10 and the claws 22 prone to particle pollution. In addition, a robot arm 70 for transferring the wafer 10 is arranged in the transfer module 40 in the host platform of the plasma processing apparatus. However, after the robotic arm 70 supports the wafer 10 with high temperature in the plasma stripping equipment, the surface of the O-ring 71 where the robotic arm 70 supports the wafer 10 will stick to the plasma stripping equipment. The composite organic matter in the wafer becomes sticky, and then sticks to the lower surface of the wafer 10 . When the robotic arm 70 places the wafer 10 in the air lock chamber 20 , the robotic arm 70 moves downward, and the complete separation of the O-ring 71 stuck on the wafer 10 from the wafer 10 will cause the wafer 10 to bounce and thus contact the carrier. The claws 22 collide or rub, eventually making particle contamination worse.

Therefore, how to reduce the source of particle pollution in the airlock to optimize the performance of particles on the wafer surface has become one of the goals of the industry.

The purpose of the present invention is to provide a holding claw, an air lock chamber and a host platform of a plasma processing device, so as to reduce the source of particle pollution in the air lock chamber and optimize the performance of particles on the wafer surface.

In order to achieve the above purpose, the present invention provides a support claw, two pairs of support claw are in contact with the edge portion of the wafer to support the wafer; the support claw includes a soft wear-resistant material, and the soft wear-resistant material is arranged on the support claw. , used to reduce or avoid particles generated when the wafer is in contact with the jaws.

In the above-mentioned support claw, the soft wear-resistant material is a soft wear-resistant coating covering the surface of the support claw.

In the above-mentioned support claw, the thickness of the soft wear-resistant coating is 10 μm-120 μm.

In the above-mentioned claws, the soft wear-resistant coating is obtained by spraying.

In the above-mentioned support claw, wherein, the soft wear-resistant material is a soft wear-resistant piece embedded or fitted on the support claw.

In the above-mentioned support claw, wherein the soft wear-resistant piece is detachably connected with the support claw.

In the above-mentioned claws, the soft wear-resistant material is a polymer.

In the above-mentioned claws, the polymer is Teflon.

The present invention further provides an air lock chamber, the air lock chamber includes an air lock chamber cavity and a plurality of the above-mentioned supporting claws arranged in the air lock chamber cavity, wherein the pair of two supporting claws and the edge part of the wafer contact to support the wafer.

The present invention further provides a host platform of a plasma processing device, which includes the above-mentioned air lock chamber, an equipment front-end module, a transmission module and a process module.

In the above-mentioned host platform of the plasma processing device, a robot arm is installed in the transfer module for transferring wafers between the air lock chamber and the process module, and an O-ring is arranged on the robot arm to carry the wafer.

In the above-mentioned host platform of the plasma processing device, the process module is a plasma degumming device.

Compared with the prior art, the present invention has the following beneficial effects:

The present invention realizes the soft contact between the support claw and the wafer by arranging soft wear-resistant materials (such as Teflon and other materials) on the support claw, effectively avoiding the friction and collision caused by the direct hard contact between the wafer and the support claw, and furthermore It can prevent the generation of particles and greatly optimize the performance of particles on the wafer surface. The invention can cover the surface of the support claw in the air lock chamber with the soft wear-resistant coating by spraying and other methods, and can also be embedded or fitted on the support claw by making an independent soft wear-resistant piece. The process is simple and easy to implement.

The specific embodiments of the present invention will be described in more detail below with reference to the schematic diagrams. The advantages and features of the present invention will become more apparent from the following description and claims. It should be noted that, the accompanying drawings are all in a very simplified form and in inaccurate scales, and are only used to facilitate and clearly assist the purpose of explaining the embodiments of the present invention.

In the interest of clarity, not all features of an actual embodiment are described. In the following description, well-known functions and constructions are not described in detail since they would obscure the invention with unnecessary detail. It should be recognized that in the development of any actual embodiment, numerous implementation details must be made to achieve the developer's specific goals, such as changing from one embodiment to another in accordance with system-related or business-related constraints. In addition, it should be appreciated that such a development effort may be complex and time consuming, but would be merely routine work to one of ordinary skill in the art to which the invention pertains.

It should be noted that, the accompanying drawings are in a very simplified form and use imprecise ratios, and are only used to facilitate and clearly assist the purpose of explaining an embodiment of the present invention.

As shown in FIG. 2, the present invention provides an air lock chamber 20, which includes an air lock chamber cavity 21 and a plurality of pairs of claws 22 disposed therein, and the pair of two claws are connected to the edge portion of the wafer. Contact to support the wafer; the support claw 22 includes soft wear-resistant material, and the soft wear-resistant material is arranged on the support claw to reduce or avoid particles generated when the wafer is in contact with the support claw. In this embodiment, the air lock chamber cavity 21 is provided with four pairs of claws 22, which can be used between the equipment front-end module 30 of the host platform of the plasma processing apparatus and the air lock chamber 20 and between the air lock chamber 20 and the air lock chamber 20. Temporary placement when transferring wafers 10 between transfer modules 40 . The air lock chamber body 21 is also connected with a vacuum pump 23 for providing a vacuum environment in the air lock chamber 20 so that the wafers 10 in the air lock chamber 20 and the transfer module 40 can be exchanged.

The claws 22 are made of hard materials such as ceramics, and have sufficient strength to support and place the wafer 10 , but correspondingly cause hard contact with the wafer 10 , thereby causing particle contamination. By disposing a soft wear-resistant material on the claws 22 to avoid direct contact between the wafer 10 and the claws 22, soft contact between the wafer 10 and the claws 22 can be achieved without affecting the existing operation, thereby reducing particle contamination , to optimize the performance of particles on the surface of the wafer 10 and prevent the occurrence of process defects.

In the air lock chamber 20 provided by the present invention capable of reducing particle contamination, the arrangement of the soft wear-resistant material on the claws 22 can be implemented in different ways, as long as direct hard contact between the claws 22 and the wafer 10 can be avoided, It can be arranged between the claws 22 and the wafer 10 and is in soft contact with the wafer 10 .

In view of the technical problem to be solved by the present invention, the selected soft wear-resistant material can be any kind of material as long as it satisfies the soft wear-resistant characteristics, that is, the soft wear-resistant material realizes soft contact with the wafer 10 . For example, the soft wear material may be selected as a polymer with soft wear characteristics. Still further, the polymer can be selected as inexpensive Teflon. The Teflon with soft and wear-resistant characteristics does not generate particles after friction with the silicon wafer. Experiments show that the number of particles on the surface of the wafer 10 is significantly reduced, which achieves the intended purpose of the present invention.

The soft wear-resistant material can be selected as a soft wear-resistant coating covering the surface of the claws 22 . In the embodiment shown in FIG. 3 , the soft wear-resistant coating may preferably be a Teflon coating 221 . The coating may cover the entire surface of the claws 22 , or may cover the upper surfaces in contact with the wafer 10 , or may be provided with a soft wear-resistant layer only on the upper surfaces of the claws 22 that only contact the wafer 10 . coating. The above methods can all achieve the technical effect that the present invention can achieve, but in the actual processing process, it is a simpler and easier way to cover the surface of the entire supporting claw 22 with a soft wear-resistant coating, and the increase in cost can be can be ignored.

The thickness of the soft wear-resistant layer in the above embodiment does not have a fundamental impact on the technical effect that can be achieved by the present invention. However, considering the limitations of the specific process and the balance between the actual effect and the cost, the thickness of the soft wear-resistant coating is 10μm-120μm is a more suitable solution.

For the actual processing process, the soft wear-resistant coating is obtained by spraying. In one embodiment, a Teflon coating 221 may be sprayed on the surface of the claws 22 in the air lock chamber 20 to reduce the number of particles on the surface of the wafer 10 . Specifically, the following process steps can be used:

(1) Handling of the claws 22

In order to obtain sufficient surface adhesion for the surface layer of the claws 22, all grease on the surface to be coated must be removed first. The specific steps are: first, use an organic solvent to dissolve the grease and heat it to about 400 degrees to make it completely volatilized; then, clean the surface of the claws 22, and further improve the Teflon by applying an adhesive (primer) The ability of the coating 221 to bond to the surface of the workpiece.

(2) Teflon coating 221 spraying

First, the Teflon coating 221 material is evenly distributed in the solvent to form a dispersion, and then the mixture is sprayed on the surface of the support claw 22 through high-pressure air atomization. The spray coating material must be uniform.

(3) Drying

The wet Teflon coating 221 is heated in an oven controlled below 100 degrees until most of the solvent has evaporated.

(4) Sintering

The dried claws 22 are heated to a higher temperature, until an irreversible reaction occurs: the Teflon coating 221 material melts and forms a network structure with the adhesive agent.

Through the above method, the claws 22 with the Teflon coating 221 can be obtained, which effectively avoids the direct contact between the wafer 10 and the claws 22 . And the Teflon coating 221 can be further modified to improve its wear resistance in practical application.

The soft wear-resistant material can be optionally designed as a three-dimensional separate component with a certain shape and structure, and the soft wear-resistant material can be arranged on the support claw 22 by means of embedding or fitting. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 4 , a soft wear-resistant piece 222 is inserted on the claw 22 , and the top end of the soft wear-resistant piece 222 protrudes from the upper end face of the claw 22 to directly contact the wafer 10 and align it with the wafer 10 . support. Optionally, the soft wear piece 222 is a Teflon piece. This method is relatively simple to manufacture, and does not need to coat the entire part of the supporting claw 22 .

For example, a groove structure can be formed on the support claw 22, and a soft wear-resistant piece with a shape matching the groove is inserted into the groove and fixedly connected with the support claw 22, and a part of the soft wear-resistant piece is removed from the groove. The center protrudes out to support the wafer 10 , so that direct contact between the claws 22 and the wafer 10 can be avoided.

For another example, a soft wear-resistant member may be pasted or fixed on the surface of the support claw 22 so that the support claw 22 does not directly contact the wafer 10 . Further, for replacement after a period of use, the soft wear-resistant parts are detachably connected to the claws 22 .

According to the technical concept of the present invention, the technical idea of solving the particle contamination in the air lock chamber 20 proposed by the present invention can be applied to other positions on the host platform of the entire plasma processing device, as long as it is the source of particle contamination caused by friction or collision, After the soft wear-resistant material is set, the original technical requirements can still be met, which can be realized by using the technical ideas provided by the present invention.

As shown in FIG. 5 , the present invention further provides a host platform of a plasma processing device including the above-mentioned air lock chamber 20 . The host platform includes a device front-end module 30 , an air lock chamber 20 , a transmission module 40 and a plurality of The process module 50, for example, the process module 50 is a plasma stripping device. Wafer 10 is brought into the atmosphere and placed on equipment front end module 30 . Subsequently, the wafer 10 needs to be transferred into the air lock chamber 20, the function of which is to transfer the wafer 10 from the atmospheric environment to the vacuum environment or vice versa. A robot arm 70 is installed in the transfer module 40 maintained in a vacuum environment, and the robot arm 70 is used to take out the wafer 10 to be processed from the air lock chamber 20 and pass through the space between the transfer module 40 and each processing chamber 50 . The gate valve 60 between them loads the wafers 10 into a plurality of process modules 50, and processes the wafers 10 to be processed (eg, etching/resist stripping/chemical vapor deposition, etc.). After the wafer 10 is processed, the robot arm 70 takes out the processed wafer 10 from the process module 50 , and transmits the processed wafer 10 to the outside atmosphere through the air lock chamber 20 .

Specifically, the air lock chamber 20 has two gate valves 60 that cannot be opened at the same time, wherein one gate valve 60 communicates with the equipment front-end module 30 , and the other gate valve 60 communicates with the transmission module 40 . When the gate valve 60 on the equipment front-end module 30 side is opened, the air lock chamber 20 is maintained in the atmospheric environment, and the wafers 10 in the air lock chamber 20 and the equipment front-end module 30 can be exchanged. When the gate valve 60 on the transfer module 40 side is opened, the air lock chamber 20 is maintained in a vacuum environment by the vacuum pump 23, and the wafers 10 in the air lock chamber 20 and the transfer module 40 can be exchanged.

In the air lock chamber 20 in the host platform of the plasma processing apparatus provided by the present invention, soft wear-resistant material is provided on the surface of the claw 22 for placing the wafer 10 to avoid direct contact between the wafer 10 and the claw 22 . By arranging a soft wear-resistant material (such as Teflon or the like) on the holding claw 22, the soft contact between the holding claw 22 and the wafer 10 is realized, which effectively avoids the friction caused by the hard contact between the wafer 10 and the holding claw 22, and further The generation of particles can be prevented, and the performance of the particles on the surface of the wafer 10 can be greatly optimized. In addition, after the robot arm 70 supports the high-temperature wafer 10 from the plasma debonding equipment, the O-ring 71 at the position where the robot arm 70 supports the wafer 10 becomes sticky and heavy between the wafer 10 and the holding claw 22 . Friction and collision issues.

Although the content of the present invention has been described in detail through the above preferred embodiments, it should be recognized that the above description should not be construed as limiting the present invention. Various modifications and substitutions to the present invention will become apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art to which the invention pertains after reading the foregoing disclosure. Therefore, the protection scope of the present invention should be defined by the appended claims.

10: Wafer 20: Air lock room 21: air lock chamber 22: Claws 221: Teflon coating 222: Soft wear parts 23: Vacuum pump 30: Equipment front-end module 40: Transmission module 50: Process module 60: Gate valve 70: Robotic Arm 71: O-ring

Figure 1 is a schematic diagram of the principle of particle contamination in the air lock chamber of the existing plasma processing device; Figure 2 is a schematic structural diagram of a preferred embodiment of an air lock chamber of the present invention; Figure 3 is a schematic structural diagram of a preferred embodiment of the arrangement of the soft wear-resistant material on the claws of the present invention; Figure 4 is a schematic structural diagram of another preferred embodiment of the arrangement of the soft wear-resistant material on the claws of the present invention; FIG. 5 is a schematic structural diagram of a preferred embodiment of the host platform of the plasma processing apparatus of the present invention.

22: Claws

221: Teflon coating

Claims (11)

An air lock chamber, the air lock chamber includes an air lock chamber cavity and a plurality of claws arranged in the air lock chamber cavity, wherein two pairs of the claws are in contact with the edge part of a wafer to support supporting the wafer; the supporting claw includes a soft wear-resistant material, and the soft wear-resistant material is arranged on the supporting claw to reduce or avoid particles generated when the wafer is in contact with the supporting claw. The air lock chamber of claim 1, wherein the soft wear-resistant material is a soft wear-resistant coating covering the surface of the claw. The air lock chamber according to claim 2, wherein the thickness of the soft wear-resistant coating is 10 μm-120 μm. The air lock chamber of claim 2, wherein the soft wear-resistant coating is obtained by spraying. The air lock chamber according to claim 1, wherein the soft wear-resistant material is a soft wear-resistant piece embedded in or attached to the claw. The air lock chamber as claimed in claim 5, wherein the soft wear-resistant member is detachably connected to the claw. The air lock chamber of claim 1, wherein the soft wear-resistant material is a polymer. The air lock chamber of claim 7, wherein the polymer is Teflon. A host platform for a plasma processing device, comprising an air lock chamber as described in any one of claims 1 to 8, an equipment front-end module, a transmission module and a process module. The plasma processing device host platform of claim 9, wherein the transmission module A robotic arm is installed inside for transferring a wafer between the air lock chamber and the process module, and an O-ring is arranged on the robotic arm to carry the wafer. The plasma processing device host platform of claim 9, wherein the process module includes a plasma degumming device.

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