JPH07171478A - Substrate treating device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve treating efficiency while reducing the size over the entire part of the device. CONSTITUTION:Two pieces of third cooling treatment sections 19, 19 for parallel treatment are installed between a first treatment unit 2 having a first substrate transporting means 7 capable of transporting a substrate W in a horizontal direction and a second treatment unit 3 having a second substrate transporting means 18 capable of transporting the substrate W in a horizontal direction. The treating device is so constituted that the substrate W is carried into the third cooling treatment sections 19, 19 and is ejected out of these sections respectively by the first and second substrate transporting means 7, 18.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention conveys a substrate such as a semiconductor wafer, a glass substrate for a liquid crystal display device or a glass substrate for a photomask between various processing units and also to a predetermined substrate processing section, The present invention relates to a substrate processing apparatus for applying a photoresist solution to a substrate, performing an exposure process, developing a photoresist applied to a substrate, and the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a substrate processing apparatus of this type, conventionally, a substrate transfer means for transferring a substrate in a horizontal direction is provided in each of various processing units, and an interface section is provided between the processing units to provide one processing unit. When a substrate is transferred from one processing unit to another processing unit, the substrate is temporarily transferred to the interface section by the substrate transfer unit of one processing unit and received, and the substrate is taken out and transferred by the substrate transfer unit of the other processing unit. It is configured to go.

However, since the interface section is interposed between the processing units, there is a problem that the entire apparatus becomes large in size, and extra time is required for the transfer at the interface section. In the case of operating without loss, for example, when the exposure apparatus finishes the exposure process and takes out the substrate, the next substrate must be supplied to the exposure apparatus, and the pretreatment is performed during the processing time of the exposure apparatus. There is a disadvantage that the number of units in the pretreatment must be increased in order to obtain a finished substrate.

Therefore, in order to avoid the increase in size of the device due to the interposition of the interface portion, for example, as in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 4-84410, a first method is to apply a resist to a substrate and heat it. There is one in which one temperature adjusting stage is provided between the device and a second device for exposing a substrate coated with a resist, for adjusting the temperature of the substrate carried in from the first device and performing centering. .

[0005]

However, in the case of the conventional example as described above, when the time required for the processing in the second apparatus for exposing the substrate is shorter than the time required for the temperature control of the substrate, the temperature control stage is used. However, there is a drawback in that the operation time of the second device is lost due to the processing in step 1, and the reduction in processing efficiency cannot be avoided even if the size of the device can be avoided.

The present invention has been made in view of such circumstances, and the substrate processing apparatus of the invention according to claim 1 is
An object of the present invention is to make it possible to improve the processing efficiency while reducing the size of the entire apparatus. Further, the substrate processing apparatus of the invention according to claim 2 can make the entire apparatus more compact and shorten the substrate transfer time. The purpose is to further improve the processing efficiency.

[0007]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a substrate processing apparatus having a first substrate transfer means capable of horizontally transferring a substrate in order to achieve the above object. Between the first processing unit and the second processing unit having the second substrate transfer unit capable of horizontally transferring the substrate, and carrying in the substrate by at least one of the first and second substrate transfer units. On the other hand, a plurality of substrate processing units for parallel processing for carrying out the substrate are provided and configured.

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the substrate processing apparatus according to the second aspect of the present invention has the above-mentioned first aspect.
In the first processing unit of the substrate processing apparatus according to the invention, the substrate processing section is provided on each of both sides of the horizontal movement path of the first substrate transfer means in the direction parallel to the second processing unit. In addition, the second processing unit is configured to have the substrate processing units on both sides of the horizontal movement path of the second substrate transfer means in the direction parallel to the first processing unit. .

[0009]

According to the structure of the substrate processing apparatus of the first aspect of the present invention, the substrate processed by the first processing unit is subjected to another processing by the substrate processing unit and then processed by the second processing unit. In this case, the first processing unit is transferred to the second processing unit via the substrate processing section, and a plurality of the substrate processing sections are provided for parallel processing so that the substrates are processed by the respective substrate processing sections. Time is second
Even when the processing time for the substrate in the processing unit is longer than the processing time, the substrate, which has been appropriately processed, is selected and taken out from the plurality of substrate processing units, and is promptly supplied to the second processing unit for processing. You can

According to the structure of the substrate processing apparatus of the second aspect of the present invention, in each of the first and second processing units, for example, a substrate processing unit for resist coating and subsequent heating and cooling are performed. The substrate processing units such as the substrate processing unit for allocating the first and second processing units are allocated to each other with the horizontal movement paths of the first and second substrate transfer units facing each other in the direction, and close to each other. In addition to the above, the substrate transfer distance between the substrate processing sections by the first and second substrate transfer means can be shortened.

[0011]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is an overall schematic perspective view showing an embodiment of a substrate processing apparatus according to the present invention.

This substrate processing apparatus is an apparatus for applying a photoresist solution to a substrate W such as a semiconductor wafer, a glass substrate for a liquid crystal display device, or a glass substrate for a photomask, as well as exposing and developing it. , An indexer unit 1 for storing unprocessed substrates and processed substrates, a first processing unit 2 including various substrate processing units for cleaning, heat-treating, and resist-coating a substrate W, and an edge The second processing unit 3 includes various substrate processing units that perform exposure processing, development processing, and heat processing, an interface 4, and an exposure unit 5 (see FIG. 2).

The indexer unit 1 includes a fixed base 6 on which the cassettes C containing the substrates W are placed in a line.
The indexer transport robot 8 transports the substrate W between the cassette C and the substrate transfer position P with the first substrate transport means 7, which will be described later. Each of the cassettes C ... Can accommodate substrates W in multiple stages.

The first processing unit 2 has a structure shown in FIG.
As shown in the overall plan view of FIG. 2 and the overall schematic vertical sectional view of FIG. 2B, one cleaning processing unit 9 that supplies the cleaning liquid to the surface of the substrate W while rotating the substrate W, and A pair of hydrophobizing units 10, 10 arranged in parallel in the horizontal direction for hydrophobizing the surface of the substrate, and the hydrophobizing units 10, 1.
0 first cooling processing units 11 and 11 provided below each of them to cool the substrate W after the hydrophobization processing, and a pair arranged in parallel in the horizontal direction for coating the surface of the substrate with a photoresist solution. Of the coating treatment sections 12 and 12, the total of four first heat treatment sections 13 placed in two stages on the hydrophobic treatment sections 10 and 10, and the substrate W is transferred to each treatment section and the like. And a first substrate transfer means 7 for loading and unloading.

The cleaning processing section 9 and the hydrophobic processing sections 10 and 1
0 and the first heat treatment section 13 ... And the coating treatment section 12,
The reference numeral 12 is distributed and arranged with a horizontal movement path R facing the direction in which the first and second processing units 2 and 3 of the first substrate transfer means 7 are arranged in parallel.

In the second processing unit 3, a pair of edge exposure processing parts 14, 14 arranged in parallel in the horizontal direction, and a pair of edge exposure processing parts 14 arranged in the horizontal direction are arranged in four stages, respectively.
Second heat treatment parts 15a, 15a and six third heat treatment parts
, And the second cooling processing units 16 and 16 placed in the upper and lower two stages, and three development processing units that are arranged in parallel in the horizontal direction to develop the substrate W after the exposure processing. 17 ...
And a second substrate carrying means 18 for carrying the substrate W into and out of each processing section.

The edge exposure processing sections 14, 14, the second and third heat processing sections 15a, 15b ... And the second cooling processing sections 16, 16 and the development processing section 17 ... The first and second processing units 2, 2 of the means 18.
3 are arranged so as to be sandwiched by a horizontal movement path R facing the parallel installation direction.

Located between the cleaning processing section 9 of the first processing unit 2 and the third heating processing section 15b of the second processing unit 3 and above a part of the second cooling processing section 16. The upper and lower third cooling processing units 19 and 19 are provided. B in the drawing shows a controller box in which various controllers are installed.

The first and second substrate transfer means 7, 1
8 is a pair of upper and lower support arms 21 and 21 for mounting and holding the outer peripheral edge side of the substrate W on a support member 20 that can be moved along a movement path R, moved up and down, and rotated in a horizontal plane.
Are linearly movable. The first and second substrate transfer means 7 and 18 carry in and carry out the substrate W to and from the third cooling processing parts 19 and 19, respectively, in a state where they have moved to the ends of the adjacent units 2 or 3. It is configured to be able to. Note that the first and second substrate transfer means 7 and 18 drive the support member 20 to load and unload a substrate to and from each processing unit in each processing unit 2 and 3, respectively. As indicated by a solid line in (a) of FIG. 7, the moving direction of the support arm 21 is perpendicular to the moving path R of the support member 20. Then, the substrate is loaded and unloaded by moving the support arm 21 forward and backward. On the other hand, when the substrate is loaded into or unloaded from the third cooling processing unit 19, 19, the support member 20 is driven to move the support arm 2 as shown by a chain double-dashed line in FIG.
The moving direction of 1 is inclined with respect to the moving path R of the support member 20 by an angle of, for example, 45 degrees. Then, the substrate is loaded and unloaded by moving the support arm 21 forward and backward.

Next, a series of processing operations by the substrate processing apparatus will be described with reference to FIG. 3 showing the relationship between the flow of processing steps and processing time.

First, in the indexer unit 1 (denoted as IND), the unprocessed substrate W is taken out from the cassette C by the indexer transport robot 8 and transported to the substrate delivery position P (S1), and the first substrate transport means 7 operates. Hand over to one support arm 21. Also, if the first substrate transfer means 7
If the processed substrate W is present on the other support arm 21, the substrate W is received, transported, and stored in the cassette C.

Next, the first substrate transfer means 7 transfers the substrate W from the substrate transfer position P to the cleaning processing section 9 (denoted by SSW) for cleaning (S2), and after the cleaning processing, the hydrophobic processing section 10 The substrate W is transported to (displayed as AH) and subjected to a hydrophobic treatment (S3).

After the hydrophobizing treatment, the substrate W is transported to the first cooling processing unit 11 (denoted by CP) and cooled (S4) and returned to room temperature, and then the coating treatment unit 12 (denoted by SC).
The substrate W is transported to and the photoresist solution is applied to the substrate surface (S5).

After that, the substrate W, which has been subjected to the coating process, is conveyed to the first heat processing section 13 (denoted by HP) and heated (S).
6) Then, the first substrate transfer means 7 transfers the substrate W after the heat treatment to the third cooling processing section 19 (denoted as CP) to cool it (S7) and returns it to about room temperature.

After the cooling processing, the substrate W is taken out of the third cooling processing section 19 by the second substrate transfer means 18, and is transferred to the edge exposure processing section 14 (denoted as EEW) so that the substrate W is not exposed outside the substrate W. The peripheral edge is exposed (S
8) Thereafter, the substrate W is transported to the exposure unit 5 (denoted by EXP) and the entire surface of the substrate is exposed (S).
The substrate W is transported from 9) to the second heat treatment section 15a (denoted by HP) and heated (S10).

The substrate W after the heat treatment is transported to the third cooling processing unit 19 (denoted by CP) to be cooled (S11), returned to room temperature, and then transported to the development processing unit 17. , Development processing is performed (S12).

After the development processing, the third heat treatment section 1
The substrate W is transported to 5b and heated (S13), and thereafter,
The substrate W after the heat treatment is taken out by the second substrate carrying means 18, once carried into the third cooling processing part 19 (indicated as IF) (S14), and carried out by the first substrate carrying means 7. The substrate is conveyed to the delivery position P. This step S
In 14, the substrate W passes through the third cooling processing section 19, but the cooling processing is not performed. That is, the third cooling processing unit 19 is provided with a pin (not shown) penetrating a cooling plate (not shown) so as to be able to move up and down, and this pin is removed from the support arm 21 of each substrate transfer means 7, 18. After receiving and supporting the substrate W, the pins are lowered and the substrate W is placed on the cooling plate to start cooling. In this step S14, the pins are fed from the second substrate carrying means 18 to each other. When the substrate W is transferred to the substrate W, the first substrate transfer means 7 receives the substrate W from the pin and carries it out without lowering the pin. In this embodiment, step S1
No cooling process is performed in step 4, but step S1
You may make it perform a cooling process in 4.

In the above operation, the two support arms 21 and 21 of each substrate transfer means 7 and 18 function as follows. That is, for example, the first substrate transfer means 7 that has received the substrate W on one of the support arms 21 in step S1 moves to the front of the cleaning processing unit 9 next. Therefore, the substrate W that has already undergone the cleaning processing in the cleaning processing unit 9
Is received by the other support arm 21, and the substrate W of the one support arm 21 is carried into the vacant cleaning processing section 9 (S2). Then, the first substrate transfer means 7 moves to the front of the hydrophobization processing unit 10, and there, already.
In, the substrate subjected to the hydrophobic treatment is received by the one support arm 21, and the substrate subjected to the cleaning treatment of the other support arm 21 is carried into the vacant hydrophobic treatment unit 10 (S3).

Each substrate transfer means 7 and 18 is
While holding the substrate W on one of the supporting arms 21 and 21 of the book to move between the processing units, the other supporting arm 21 receives the substrate W from the processing unit and carries it out, and also holds it on the one supporting arm 21. The operation of loading the processed substrate W into the processing section is repeated. The movement of each substrate transfer means 7, 18 is
It becomes like the thin arrow in the flow of Fig. 3, and each is 7
Repeated movement is one cycle. Then, each time the substrate transfer means 7 and 18 move between the processing units, one substrate W is advanced by one step. The movement of the substrate W is as shown by the thick arrow in the flow of FIG.
The numbers on the left side of the flow box in FIG. 3 indicate the number of processing units.

The processing time in each processing step varies as shown in FIG. 3 as an example. Therefore, in consideration of fully operating the exposure unit 5 whose equipment is extremely expensive, for example, the exposure unit 5 is operated. Assuming that the required processing time for one substrate W is 35 seconds, the number of processing units installed in each processing step allows one substrate W to be taken out within the processing time (35 seconds) from the processing step. Is set. For example, in the first heat treatment unit 13, each substrate W is heated for 120 seconds (process processing time) after the photoresist solution is applied, and substrate W is loaded and unloaded for 10 seconds (delivery processing time). ) And a total of 130 seconds (processing time). Therefore, the first heat treatment unit 13
By providing four of them and performing heat treatment in sequence by shifting them for each cycle of the first substrate transfer means 7, the time for which the substrate W can be taken out is set to 32.5 seconds (time required for parallel processing), and the substrate W is It is designed so that it can be taken out within seconds. The same applies to the other substrate processing units. Here, the delivery processing time is the sum of the delivery time with the substrate transfer means 7 and the above-mentioned time required for raising and lowering the pins.

Further, in the third cooling processing section 19, 19, the first processing unit 2 to the second processing unit 3
Since the cooling process is performed in parallel at the transfer position to the first and second transfer units, the time (for example, 10 seconds) for the transfer process is shorter than that in the case where the cooling processing unit corresponding to step S7 is provided in the first processing unit 2. It becomes unnecessary. Furthermore, the number of steps (S1) in each of the first and second processing units 2 and 3
To S7, S8 to S14) can be carried out in seven steps, the number of times of carrying can be reduced, and the carrying time for each step (one moving time of each substrate carrying means 7, 18 and one carrying with the processing section). If the sum of the transfer time) is 5 seconds, the transfer cycle of each of the first and second substrate transfer means 7 and 18 can be set to 35 seconds, which is the same as the processing time in the exposure unit 5, and as a result, Two processing units 2, 3 and 1 for the exposure unit 5
The substrate processing apparatus can be configured only by including the individual interfaces 4. Step S7 in the first processing unit 2
When a cooling processing unit corresponding to the above is provided, it takes one time for delivery and the number of steps is eight.
As a process, the carrying cycle of one unit becomes 40 seconds, which does not reach the processing time of the exposure unit 5 of 35 seconds. In that case, in order to process one substrate every 35 seconds, it is necessary to increase the number of substrate transfer means in order to reduce the number of steps handled by one substrate transfer means. As a result, the number of units is increased. It had to be increased, and the size of the entire device was to be increased.

In the above embodiment, the third cooling processing unit 19 is interposed between the first processing unit 2 and the second processing unit 3 as a substrate processing unit for parallel processing. The present invention is applicable to various substrate processing units such as the coating processing unit 12, the first and second heat processing units 13 and 15, the first and third cooling processing units 11 and 19, and the development processing unit 17. It can be carried out instead.

The substrate processing apparatus of the present invention can be applied not only to the circular substrate W as described above but also to a rectangular substrate.

[0035]

As described above, according to the substrate processing apparatus of the first aspect of the present invention, the first processing unit and the second processing unit are provided.
Substrates are processed in parallel by a plurality of substrate processing units between the other processing units, and the processing time for the substrates in each substrate processing unit is
Even when the processing time for the substrate in the processing unit is longer than the processing time, the substrate, which has been appropriately processed, is selected and taken out from the plurality of substrate processing units, and is promptly supplied to the second processing unit for processing. Therefore, a dedicated interface for transferring the substrate between the first processing unit and the second processing unit is not required, the entire apparatus can be downsized, and the second processing unit can be operated without waste. The processing efficiency can be improved.

According to the structure of the substrate processing apparatus of the second aspect of the present invention, in the first and second processing units, the first and second processing units are arranged in the direction in which the first and second processing units are arranged in parallel. Since the substrate processing units are distributed and arranged in close proximity to each other with the horizontal movement paths of the two substrate transporting units in between, the entire apparatus is more excellent than when the substrate processing units are arranged in a straight line. The substrate can be made more compact, and further, the substrate transfer distance between the substrate processing sections by the first and second substrate transfer means can be shortened, the time required for the substrate transfer can be shortened easily, and the processing efficiency can be further improved. It became so.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a partially cutaway perspective view showing an embodiment of a substrate processing apparatus according to the present invention.

2A is an overall plan view, and FIG. 2B is an overall schematic vertical sectional view.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a relationship between processing steps and processing time.

[Explanation of symbols]

 2 ... 1st processing unit 3 ... 2nd processing unit 7 ... 1st board | substrate conveyance means 9 ... Cleaning processing part 10 ... Hydrophobicization processing part 11 ... 1st cooling processing part 12 ... Coating processing part 13 ... 1st Heat treatment part 14 ... Edge exposure treatment part 15a ... Second heat treatment part 15b ... Third heat treatment part 16 ... Second cooling treatment part 17 ... Development treatment part 18 ... Second substrate transfer means 19 ... Cooling processing section 3 ... R ... moving path W ... substrate

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A first processing unit having a first substrate transfer means capable of horizontally transferring a substrate, and a second processing unit having a second substrate transfer means capable of horizontally transferring the substrate. And a plurality of substrate processing units for parallel processing for loading the substrate by at least one of the first and second substrate transfer means and unloading the substrate by the other. Processing equipment. 2. The first processing unit according to claim 1, wherein the substrate processing is performed on both sides of a horizontal movement path of the first substrate transfer means in a direction parallel to the second processing unit. And in the second processing unit, the substrate processing section is provided on each of both sides of the horizontal movement path of the second substrate transfer means in the direction parallel to the first processing unit. Substrate processing equipment that is one.