JP3340720B2 - Peripheral exposure equipment - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a peripheral exposure apparatus for exposing an unnecessary resist area around an area where a predetermined mask pattern is exposed, of a resist formed on the surface of a rectangular substrate.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art When a wiring pattern is formed on a substrate such as a semiconductor wafer or a liquid crystal display panel, first, a resist is applied to the entire surface of the substrate and then patterned into a desired shape by a photolithography method. The exposure position of the mask pattern is determined so that a strip-shaped margin having a width of about several mm is formed around the substrate.

For this reason, if a positive resist is used in the photolithography process, the unexposed resist remains in a strip shape around the substrate after the development process. Such a residual resist is not only unnecessary, but also becomes dust in a later manufacturing process, and thus poses a serious problem as one of the causes of a decrease in throughput. Therefore, it is necessary to expose and develop such unnecessary resist areas to remove them.

Conventionally, as a peripheral exposure apparatus for a rectangular substrate, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Nos. 11-154639 and
An apparatus described in -190448 is known.

[0005] First, the former device is adapted to perform peripheral exposure even when the size of the work is increased, and to perform the peripheral exposure without rotating the work. And a guide 2 provided on at least one side of the mounting table 5, a moving mechanism 3 moving along the guide 2, and a light source device 4 movably provided along the moving mechanism 3. In addition, the light source device 4 is configured to rotate while exposing the periphery of the work.

In the latter device, a light source unit 24 for supplying light and a plate P by restricting light from the light source unit 24 are provided.
In order to form a desired pattern on G, a plurality of blinds 40 to 43 that move in the XY plane, and blind drive units 30 to 43 that change the positions of the blinds 40 to 43
And a control unit 5 for controlling the driving of the blind driving units 30 to 33 to change the positions of the blinds 40 to 43.
The light source unit 24 includes a long-arc-type rod lamp 1 as a light source, a hollow semi-cylindrical concave mirror 2 having a parabolic reflective surface 2 a, and a shutter 3.

[0007]

However, in the former device, the irradiation light emitted from the light source device is a spot light, and the periphery of the work is scanned and exposed. For this reason, a moving mechanism is required on the work, which causes dust generation. In the latter device, a long arc type rod lamp is used as a light source.
41A, 41B, 42, and 43 are required, the structure is very complicated, and the transport direction of the plate PG during peripheral exposure is only the direction (Y direction) orthogonal to the axial direction of the rod-shaped lamp. For example, the second sections 72, 72 '
, It is necessary to move the plate PG at a constant speed in the Y direction.

Therefore, the present invention has a small number of dust sources and can expose the exposed sides of a rectangular substrate at once, one by one.
Further, it is an object of the present invention to provide a peripheral exposure apparatus that is compact and does not cause a decrease in throughput.

[0009]

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention comprises an exposure unit having a bar-shaped light source arranged in a horizontal direction, and a stage on which a rectangular substrate is placed. It is characterized in that it is configured to be movable only in two axes, a direction orthogonal to the axial direction of the rod-shaped light source and a rotation direction.

It is desirable that the exposure unit has a configuration in which a reflecting plate which expands downward from both ends and both sides of the rod-shaped light source, and a mask plate is attached to a lower portion of the reflecting plate.

[0011]

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a schematic perspective view showing a configuration of a peripheral exposure apparatus according to the present invention. The peripheral exposure apparatus includes an exposure unit 2 for exposing a peripheral exposure portion of a rectangular substrate 1 coated with a resist with a wide and uniform illuminance. And a stage 3 for holding the rectangular substrate 1.

The exposure unit 2 incorporates a rod-like light source 4 of ultraviolet (UV) light, a shutter 5, a reflection plate 6, a mask plate 7, and the like, and is mounted on a frame (not shown) of the apparatus.

Although one exposure unit 2 is shown in FIG. 1, a plurality of similar exposure units 2 may be used. The stage 3 has a flat configuration for holding the rectangular substrate 1 and a configuration in which support pins are protruded.
Using a structure having a mechanism for gripping the side of the rectangular substrate 1, the rectangular substrate 1 is held in a horizontal state or a vertical state.

The stage 3 combines a rotation (θ direction) mechanism 8 and a mechanism 9 that can move only in the horizontal front-rear direction (Y direction) so that the rectangular substrate 1 can be moved on a plane.

The operations of supplying the rectangular substrate 1 to the stage 3 and taking out the exposed rectangular substrate 1 are performed by a substrate transfer robot, a shuttle transfer mechanism, a roller conveyor, or the like, or manually by an operator.

When the position of the rectangular substrate 1 supplied to the stage 3 is shifted, an L-shaped positioning guide or a pin-shaped guide that contacts only three points on the L-shape is provided, and the rectangular positioning guide is provided on the positioning guide. The position can be adjusted by pressing the substrate.

FIGS. 2 and 3 are schematic sectional views showing the structure of the exposure unit 2 of the present invention.
It comprises a reflection plate 6 and a mask plate 7.

The rod-shaped light source 4 emits light at all times, and the exposure condition can be changed by controlling the opening time of the shutter 5. Here, the opening time of the shutter 5 is determined by a control device (not shown) such as a computer having functions such as an input function, a storage function, a comparison operation function, and an operation command function.
First, it is registered in the control device as product type data. The shutter 5 is a mechanism that can be arbitrarily opened and closed by an actuator such as a motor.

Further, the illuminance is periodically measured by an illuminometer 10 incorporated in the stage 3 or the like, and the illuminance measurement value is input to a control device to calculate an appropriate opening time of the shutter 5 so that the light source can elapse over time. Even in the case of deterioration, stable exposure quality can be realized.

Here, the case where the exposure condition is changed by controlling the opening time of the shutter 5 has been described. Similarly, the voltage or current of the light source is changed to adjust the light amount, or the light emitting portion of the light source is provided with a mesh mask or the like. The light amount may be adjusted by installing a light shielding plate.

As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, even when a bar-shaped light source 4 shorter than the peripheral exposure portion of the rectangular substrate 1 is used, UV light is diffused and reflected by the reflector, and the opening of the mask plate 7 is further blocked. By transmitting the light, a UV light band having a uniform illuminance can be generated. This is the larger square substrate 1
Even in this case, by changing the distance between the rod-shaped light source 1 and the substrate and the angle of expansion and size of the reflector 6, a UV light band having uniform illuminance can be generated in an arbitrary region.

The position data of the peripheral exposure portion with respect to the rectangular substrate 1 is previously registered as type data in the control device, and based on the data, the stage 3 is moved at high speed so that the first exposure side is directly below the exposure unit 2. After the stationary state, the shutter 5 is opened for a certain period of time, so that the UV of the same shape as the opening of the mask plate 7 is formed.
Irradiation light is applied to the rectangular substrate 1. As a result, the resist is exposed in a strip shape.

When this operation is performed on the rectangular substrate 1, the unnecessary resist around the rectangular substrate 1 is exposed by performing the operation on four sides, and is removed by a developing process.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart of the movement of the rectangular substrate 1 when peripherally exposing four sides around the rectangular substrate 1. As described above, high-speed positioning is performed by the Y-direction moving mechanism and the θ-direction moving mechanism at the exposure position on the first side, and the exposure is performed collectively in a stationary state. Similarly, the second, third, and fourth sides are exposed. Thereafter, the substrate is moved to the substrate removal position at a high speed by the Y-direction movement mechanism and the θ-direction movement mechanism, and the above-described removal operation is performed.

The device configuration shown in FIG. 1 is merely an example,
A plurality of exposure units 2 may be provided to increase the processing speed.

In the above embodiment, the exposure of a rectangular substrate for liquid crystal has been described. However, the peripheral exposure apparatus of the present invention can be applied to any rectangular substrate that requires a certain band-shaped exposure area. It goes without saying that the material, shape, etc. are not particularly limited.

Although the mask plate 7 has been described as having a rectangular shape, the peripheral exposure apparatus of the present invention uses the mask plate 7 having an opening having an arbitrary shape, and thus, the peripheral exposure device having an arbitrary shape can be formed similarly to the opening. Can be implemented.

[0029]

The peripheral exposure apparatus according to the present invention comprises an exposure unit having a bar-shaped light source arranged in a horizontal direction, and a stage on which a rectangular substrate is mounted. The stage is arranged in a direction perpendicular to the axial direction of the bar-shaped light source. Because only two axes in the rotation direction can be moved, the exposure side can be collectively exposed for each side by the rod-shaped light source, so that peripheral exposure can be performed in a short time and the entire apparatus can be made compact. can do. Further, since the exposure side is positioned immediately below the exposure unit by moving the stage holding the rectangular substrate, there is an effect that the number of dust sources on the target substrate can be reduced.

Further, if the exposure unit is configured such that a reflecting plate which expands downward from both ends and both sides of the rod-shaped light source and a mask plate is attached below the reflecting plate, the exposure unit is shorter than the exposure side of the rectangular substrate. With the rod-shaped light source described above, it is possible to collectively expose the exposed portion one by one with uniform irradiation light.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic perspective view showing an embodiment of the configuration of a peripheral exposure apparatus of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view from the front of an exposure unit including a rod-shaped light source, a reflector, a mask plate, and a shutter.

FIG. 3 is a side sectional view of an exposure unit including a rod-shaped light source, a reflector, a mask plate, and a shutter.

FIG. 4 is a moving flowchart of a rectangular substrate when peripheral exposure is performed by the peripheral exposure apparatus according to the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Square substrate 2 Exposure unit 3 Stage 4 Bar-shaped light source 5 Shutter 6 Reflector 7 Mask plate 8 Stage rotating mechanism 9 Stage moving mechanism 10 Illuminometer

────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (56) References JP-A-10-144603 (JP, A) JP-A-9-281711 (JP, A) (58) Fields investigated (Int. Cl. ⁷ , DB name) H01L 21/027 G03F 7/20-7/24 G03F 9/00-9/02

Claims (2)

(57) [Claims] 1. An exposure unit having a bar-shaped light source arranged in a horizontal direction, and a stage on which a rectangular substrate is placed,
A peripheral exposure apparatus, wherein the stage is configured to be movable only in two axes, a direction orthogonal to an axial direction of the rod-shaped light source and a rotation direction. 2. An exposure unit according to claim 1, wherein a reflection plate which expands downward from both ends and both side portions of the rod-shaped light source and a mask plate is attached below the reflection plate are used. Peripheral exposure device.