CN114551308A - Vacuum side wafer state obtaining method for semiconductor vacuum transmission system - Google Patents

Vacuum side wafer state obtaining method for semiconductor vacuum transmission system Download PDF

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Publication number
CN114551308A
CN114551308A CN202210104600.7A CN202210104600A CN114551308A CN 114551308 A CN114551308 A CN 114551308A CN 202210104600 A CN202210104600 A CN 202210104600A CN 114551308 A CN114551308 A CN 114551308A
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wafer
vacuum
clamping groove
state
current layer
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CN202210104600.7A
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CN114551308B (en
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董怀宝
冯琳
武一鸣
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Shanghai Guangchuan Technology Co ltd
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Shanghai Guangchuan Technology Co ltd
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    • HELECTRICITY
    • H01ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01LSEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES NOT COVERED BY CLASS H10
    • H01L21/00Processes or apparatus adapted for the manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or solid state devices or of parts thereof
    • H01L21/67Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere
    • H01L21/677Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations
    • H01L21/67784Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere for conveying, e.g. between different workstations using air tracks
    • HELECTRICITY
    • H01ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
    • H01LSEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES NOT COVERED BY CLASS H10
    • H01L21/00Processes or apparatus adapted for the manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or solid state devices or of parts thereof
    • H01L21/67Apparatus specially adapted for handling semiconductor or electric solid state devices during manufacture or treatment thereof; Apparatus specially adapted for handling wafers during manufacture or treatment of semiconductor or electric solid state devices or components ; Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere
    • H01L21/67005Apparatus not specifically provided for elsewhere
    • H01L21/67242Apparatus for monitoring, sorting or marking
    • H01L21/67259Position monitoring, e.g. misposition detection or presence detection
    • H01L21/67265Position monitoring, e.g. misposition detection or presence detection of substrates stored in a container, a magazine, a carrier, a boat or the like
    • YGENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
    • Y02TECHNOLOGIES OR APPLICATIONS FOR MITIGATION OR ADAPTATION AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE
    • Y02PCLIMATE CHANGE MITIGATION TECHNOLOGIES IN THE PRODUCTION OR PROCESSING OF GOODS
    • Y02P90/00Enabling technologies with a potential contribution to greenhouse gas [GHG] emissions mitigation
    • Y02P90/02Total factory control, e.g. smart factories, flexible manufacturing systems [FMS] or integrated manufacturing systems [IMS]

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  • Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
  • Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
  • Condensed Matter Physics & Semiconductors (AREA)
  • General Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
  • Manufacturing & Machinery (AREA)
  • Computer Hardware Design (AREA)
  • Microelectronics & Electronic Packaging (AREA)
  • Power Engineering (AREA)
  • Container, Conveyance, Adherence, Positioning, Of Wafer (AREA)

Abstract

The invention relates to the technical field of semiconductor manufacturing, and discloses a method for acquiring the state of a wafer at the vacuum side of a semiconductor vacuum transmission system. The acquisition method only needs to add the state detection sensor, does not need complex hardware, can reduce the cost to the maximum extent, and is convenient for popularization and application.

Description

Vacuum side wafer state obtaining method for semiconductor vacuum transmission system
Technical Field
The invention relates to the technical field of semiconductor manufacturing, in particular to a method for acquiring a wafer state on a vacuum side of a semiconductor vacuum transmission system.
Background
Fig. 1 shows a typical semiconductor vacuum transmission system, which mainly includes a 2-EFEM, a 3-LoadLock, a 4-vacuum transmission chamber, and a 5-process chamber, wherein a 1-atmospheric robot is a core component in the 2-EFEM and is used for transmitting a wafer from an atmospheric environment at a front end to the 3-LoadLock, the LoadLock is used as a transfer chamber between atmosphere and vacuum and needs to be frequently switched between an atmospheric state and a vacuum state, and the LoadLock generally has one or more layers of slots for storing wafers. When taking and placing the wafer from the EFEM to the LoadLock, nitrogen is required to be filled to adjust the pressure in the cavity to be in an atmospheric state, and then a transmission valve on the side of the LoadLock close to the EFEM is opened to take and place the wafer; when picking and placing the wafer from the vacuum transmission cavity to the LoadLock, the gas in the LoadLock needs to be pumped out and adjusted to be in a vacuum state, and then the transmission valve of the LoadLock close to the side of the vacuum transmission cavity is opened to pick and place the wafer.
Since the LoadLock needs to operate in a vacuum environment, it is difficult to install and route the sensor inside the LoadLock. At present, the initialization of the LoadLock wafer state is judged by means of software storage of an upper computer or visual observation, and a plurality of sudden shutdown conditions exist in the operation process of equipment, so that the LoadLock wafer state stored by the software is inconsistent with the actual state, and under the condition, if an operator neglects state confirmation and correction, wrong instructions are issued, so that faults such as a striker and the like are caused, and unnecessary economic loss and downtime are caused.
Disclosure of Invention
The invention provides a method for acquiring the state of a wafer on the vacuum side of a semiconductor vacuum transmission system, which can realize the query of the actual state of the wafer in each clamping groove in a loadLock cavity by additionally arranging a state detection sensor above the front sides of a transmission gate valve of the vacuum transmission cavity and the loadLock cavity, does not need to additionally increase complicated hardware, executes the operation after the initial or emergent emergency shutdown of equipment, and can effectively ensure the safety of wafer transmission.
The invention can be realized by the following technical scheme:
a method for acquiring the state of a wafer on the vacuum side of a semiconductor vacuum transmission system is characterized in that a state detection sensor is arranged above the front side of a transmission gate valve of a vacuum transmission cavity and a LoadLock cavity, before a vacuum robot takes and places the wafer from each layer of clamping grooves of the LoadLock cavity, the state detection sensor is used for inquiring whether the wafer is in the clamping groove on the current layer or not, the inquiry result is stored, the inquiry result is collected and uploaded to the semiconductor vacuum transmission system, and an operator is informed to supplement the wafer correspondingly.
Further, the state detection sensor is set as two AWC sensors which are arranged at intervals, the distance between the two AWC sensors is smaller than the diameter of the wafer, and light rays are emitted downwards vertically;
and when the end effector clamps the wafer and moves to the position right below the state detection sensor, the light rays of the two AWC sensors can be shielded by the wafer at the same time.
Further, a lifting mechanism is utilized to drive the current layer clamping groove to move to a picking and placing position, an end effector of the vacuum robot is started to execute a piece picking operation and moves to pass through the position right below the state detection sensor, the state detection sensor is started to execute an inquiry operation, whether the end effector clamps a wafer or not is judged and stored, if yes, the wafer is positioned in the current layer clamping groove, and then the end effector is started to place the clamped wafer back to the current layer clamping groove; if not, the wafer does not exist in the current layer of clamping groove;
then, the lifting mechanism is used for driving the plurality of layers of clamping grooves to move upwards, the process is repeated, and the inquiry operation of the state of the wafer in the next layer of clamping groove is completed until the inquiry operation of the state of the wafer in all the clamping grooves is completed;
or the end effector of the vacuum robot runs from the lowest layer to the uppermost layer of the multilayer clamping grooves, the wafer taking operation is started layer by layer and moves right below the state detection sensor, the state detection sensor is started to execute the query operation, whether the end effector clamps the wafer or not is judged and stored, if yes, the wafer is arranged in the clamping groove of the current layer, and then the end effector is started to place the clamped wafer back to the clamping groove of the current layer; if not, the wafer does not exist in the current layer of clamping groove.
And further, after the lifting mechanism is utilized to drive the current layer clamping groove to move to the picking and placing position, the current layer clamping groove is stopped for waiting for preset time, or the end effector of the vacuum robot is also stopped for waiting for preset time at the current layer clamping groove position.
The beneficial technical effects of the invention are as follows:
the method for acquiring the wafer state of the semiconductor vacuum transmission system can acquire the wafer state in each layer of clamping groove of the loadLock chamber in advance, supplements the wafer state in time, avoids the faults of collision and the like caused by subsequent picking and placing operation, reduces unnecessary economic loss, improves the overall intelligent level of the semiconductor vacuum transmission system, and meanwhile, the method for acquiring the wafer state of the loadLock chamber only needs to additionally arrange a state detection sensor, does not need complex hardware, can reduce the cost to the maximum extent, and is convenient to popularize and apply.
Drawings
FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of the general structure of a conventional semiconductor vacuum transfer system according to the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a schematic view showing a state in which the state detecting sensor of the present invention is mounted;
FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an implementation status of a first detection method according to the present invention;
FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an execution state of a second detection method according to the present invention;
the system comprises an atmospheric robot, a 2-EFEM, a 3-LoadLock, a 4-vacuum transmission cavity, a 5-process cavity, a 6-left AWC sensor, a 7-right AWC sensor, 8-ray, 9-wafer and 10-multilayer clamping grooves.
Detailed Description
The following detailed description of the preferred embodiments will be made with reference to the accompanying drawings.
In order to avoid the occurrence of objective factors such as wafer deviation or wafer breakage during wafer taking and improve the accuracy of wafer taking and placing, a semiconductor vacuum transmission system basically uses an AWC (active wafer centering) function to detect and correct, namely a group of AWC sensors containing two sensors are placed in the direction of a station to be detected, and automatic correction is performed in the movement process of a manipulator aiming at the deviation situation of an actual center and a teaching center in the process of wafer transmission by the manipulator, so that the wafer is ensured to be normally conveyed to a specified position. Therefore, with the two AWC sensors as the status detection sensors, the status of whether wafers exist in the multiple layers of slots before wafer transmission is performed, that is, as shown in fig. 1-2, the present invention provides a method for acquiring the status of a wafer at the vacuum side for a semiconductor vacuum transmission system, where the status detection sensors are disposed above the front sides of the transmission gate valves of the vacuum transmission cavity and the LoadLock cavity, and before a vacuum robot takes and places a wafer from each layer of slots of the LoadLock cavity, the status detection sensors are first used to inquire whether a wafer exists in the current layer of slots, and store the inquiry result, and then the inquiry result is gathered and uploaded to the semiconductor vacuum transmission system, so as to inform an operator to perform corresponding wafer supplement. Therefore, the states of the wafers in the clamping grooves of all layers of the loadLock chamber can be known in advance, the wafers can be supplemented in time, faults such as collision and the like caused by subsequent picking and placing operations are avoided, unnecessary economic loss is reduced, the overall intelligent level of a semiconductor vacuum transmission system is improved, meanwhile, the obtaining method only needs to additionally arrange a state detection sensor, complex hardware is not needed, the cost can be reduced to the maximum extent, and the method is convenient to popularize and apply.
The state detection sensor is set to be two AWC sensors which are arranged at intervals and are respectively a left side AWC sensor 6 and a right side AWC sensor 7, light rays of the state detection sensor are emitted downwards vertically, the distance between the left side AWC sensor and the right side AWC sensor is smaller than the diameter of a wafer, and when the end effector clamps the wafer 9 and moves to the position right below the state detection sensor, the light rays 8 of the two AWC sensors can be shielded by the wafer 9 at the same time, the wafer is used as a detection signal to judge whether the end effector clamps the wafer, other abnormal conditions such as misjudgment caused by the fact that a signal of a single sensor is used as the detection signal are avoided, and therefore the accuracy and the rapidity of judgment of a detection result are improved.
When detecting the state of the wafer in the card slot, the method can be implemented from two aspects, specifically as follows:
firstly, as shown in fig. 3, a lifting mechanism for controlling the movement of a card slot is provided in each general LoadLock chamber, so that the lifting mechanism can be used to drive the card slot on the current layer to move to a pick-and-place position, and stay for a predetermined time which cannot be at least less than the time required by the sum of the inquiry operation, the pick-and-place operation, so as to execute the subsequent operation, then an end effector of the vacuum robot is started to execute the pick-and-place operation, and moves under a state detection sensor, the state detection sensor is started to execute the inquiry operation, and whether the end effector holds a wafer is judged and stored, if yes, the wafer is in the card slot on the current layer, and then the end effector is started to place the held wafer back to the card slot on the current layer; if not, the wafer does not exist in the current layer of clamping groove;
then, the lifting mechanism is used for driving the plurality of layers of clamping grooves 10 to move upwards, the process is repeated, and the inquiry operation of the state of the wafer in the next layer of clamping groove is completed until the inquiry operation of the state of the wafer in all the clamping grooves is completed;
secondly, as shown in fig. 4, the clamping grooves can be kept still, the end effector of the vacuum robot is driven to perform query operation from bottom to top, that is, the end effector of the vacuum robot runs from the lowest layer to the uppermost layer of the multilayer clamping grooves 10, the wafer taking operation is started layer by layer and moves right below the state detection sensor, the state detection sensor is started to perform query operation, whether the end effector clamps the wafer or not is judged, and the wafer is stored, if yes, the wafer is positioned in the clamping groove of the current layer, and then the end effector is started to place the clamped wafer back to the clamping groove of the current layer; if not, the wafer does not exist in the current layer of clamping groove.
Of course, both methods need to be performed before the vacuum-side transfer valve is opened.
Although specific embodiments of the present invention have been described above, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that these are merely examples and that many variations or modifications may be made to these embodiments without departing from the principles and spirit of the invention, the scope of which is therefore defined by the appended claims.

Claims (4)

1. A method for acquiring the state of a wafer on the vacuum side of a semiconductor vacuum transmission system is characterized in that: a state detection sensor is arranged above the front side of a transmission gate valve of a vacuum transmission cavity and a LoadLock cavity, before a vacuum robot takes and places wafers from each layer of clamping grooves of the LoadLock cavity, the state detection sensor is used for inquiring whether wafers exist in the clamping grooves of the current layer or not, inquiry results are stored, the inquiry results are collected and uploaded to a semiconductor vacuum transmission system, and an operator is informed to supplement the wafers correspondingly.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the wafer state on the vacuum side is acquired by a vacuum side wafer state acquisition system, comprising: the state detection sensor is set as two AWC sensors which are arranged at intervals, the distance between the state detection sensors and the AWC sensors is smaller than the diameter of the wafer, and light rays are emitted downwards vertically;
and when the end effector clamps the wafer and moves to the position right below the state detection sensor, the light rays of the two AWC sensors can be shielded by the wafer at the same time.
3. The vacuum-side wafer state acquisition method for a semiconductor vacuum transfer system according to claim 2, characterized in that: the lifting mechanism is utilized to drive the current layer clamping groove to move to a picking and placing position, an end effector of the vacuum robot is started to execute a piece picking operation and moves right below the state detection sensor, the state detection sensor is started to execute a query operation, whether the end effector clamps a wafer or not is judged and stored, if yes, the wafer is positioned in the current layer clamping groove, and then the end effector is started to place the clamped wafer back to the current layer clamping groove; if not, the wafer does not exist in the current layer of clamping groove;
then, the lifting mechanism is used for driving the plurality of layers of clamping grooves to move upwards, the process is repeated, and the inquiry operation of the state of the wafer in the next layer of clamping groove is completed until the inquiry operation of the state of the wafer in all the clamping grooves is completed;
or the end effector of the vacuum robot runs from the lowest layer to the uppermost layer of the multilayer clamping grooves, the wafer taking operation is started layer by layer and moves right below the state detection sensor, the state detection sensor is started to execute the query operation, whether the end effector clamps the wafer or not is judged and stored, if yes, the wafer is arranged in the clamping groove of the current layer, and then the end effector is started to place the clamped wafer back to the clamping groove of the current layer; if not, the wafer does not exist in the current layer of clamping groove.
4. The vacuum-side wafer state acquisition method for a semiconductor vacuum transfer system according to claim 3, characterized in that: and after the lifting mechanism is utilized to drive the current layer clamping groove to move to the picking and placing position, the current layer clamping groove is stopped for waiting for preset time, or the end effector of the vacuum robot is stopped for waiting for preset time at the current layer clamping groove position.
CN202210104600.7A 2022-01-28 2022-01-28 Vacuum side wafer state acquisition method for semiconductor vacuum transmission system Active CN114551308B (en)

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Citations (7)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US5239182A (en) * 1991-04-19 1993-08-24 Tokyo Electron Saga Kabushiki Kaisha Wafer conveyor apparatus and method for detecting inclination of wafer inside cassette
JPH07153818A (en) * 1993-11-30 1995-06-16 Daihen Corp Semiconductor wafer recognition equipment
JP2010219209A (en) * 2009-03-16 2010-09-30 Yaskawa Electric Corp Substrate detecting device, and substrate conveying device with the same
CN110364461A (en) * 2019-07-18 2019-10-22 北京北方华创微电子装备有限公司 Wafer state detection device, method and wafer loading and unloading chamber
CN110767563A (en) * 2019-10-25 2020-02-07 上海华力集成电路制造有限公司 Method for detecting wafer integrity and RTP machine
CN111725116A (en) * 2020-06-29 2020-09-29 北京北方华创微电子装备有限公司 Method for detecting distribution state of loading cavity and wafer in semiconductor equipment
CN111968926A (en) * 2019-05-20 2020-11-20 北京北方华创微电子装备有限公司 Semiconductor equipment and semiconductor processing method

Patent Citations (7)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US5239182A (en) * 1991-04-19 1993-08-24 Tokyo Electron Saga Kabushiki Kaisha Wafer conveyor apparatus and method for detecting inclination of wafer inside cassette
JPH07153818A (en) * 1993-11-30 1995-06-16 Daihen Corp Semiconductor wafer recognition equipment
JP2010219209A (en) * 2009-03-16 2010-09-30 Yaskawa Electric Corp Substrate detecting device, and substrate conveying device with the same
CN111968926A (en) * 2019-05-20 2020-11-20 北京北方华创微电子装备有限公司 Semiconductor equipment and semiconductor processing method
CN110364461A (en) * 2019-07-18 2019-10-22 北京北方华创微电子装备有限公司 Wafer state detection device, method and wafer loading and unloading chamber
CN110767563A (en) * 2019-10-25 2020-02-07 上海华力集成电路制造有限公司 Method for detecting wafer integrity and RTP machine
CN111725116A (en) * 2020-06-29 2020-09-29 北京北方华创微电子装备有限公司 Method for detecting distribution state of loading cavity and wafer in semiconductor equipment

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