JP3516741B2 - Plasma processing method - Google Patents

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a uniform plasma for a large-diameter semiconductor wafer for manufacturing LSI or a large-area substrate for manufacturing flat panel display (FPD) which can be manufactured by application of a semiconductor process. The present invention relates to a method of performing uniform plasma processing such as dry etching using a plasma apparatus capable of performing uniform plasma processing on the entire surface of a substrate even with a plasma source having a limited region where density can be achieved.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the manufacturing field of VLSI and ULSI, the area per chip is increasing while the miniaturization of the processing pattern is progressing with the high integration, and the diameter of 8 inches ( A large-diameter wafer having a size of about 200 mm has been used. Therefore, development of a manufacturing process and a manufacturing apparatus capable of handling such a large diameter wafer is becoming an important theme. Particularly for dry etching, so-called high-density plasma devices capable of achieving an ion density of 1 × 10 ¹¹ / cm ³ such as a magnetic field microwave plasma device, an inductively coupled plasma device, and a helicon wave plasma device have been developed. .

A magnetic field microwave plasma device has a capacity of 8.7.
1. In the magnetic field of 5 × 10 ^-2 T (875 G), with the magnetic force line as the axis.
2.45 orthogonal to the magnetic field for electrons rotating at 45 GHz
A microwave electric field of GHz is applied to cause the energy to be resonantly absorbed by electrons. The electrons are accelerated in the weak magnetic field direction while expanding the Larmor radius, and collide with gas to generate high-density plasma. To do.

As shown in FIG. 7 (a), the inductively coupled plasma device has a structure in which a multi-turn antenna 33 is arranged outside an insulating cylinder 32 forming a part of a chamber 30, Plasma is excited by rotating electrons along a magnetic field that is induced by the multi-turn antenna 33 and changes with time. The ceiling of the chamber 30 is composed of an insulating top plate 31 that also serves as a flow path for gas supplied from the direction of arrow D, and the inside is exhausted in the direction of arrow C by a high vacuum system through an exhaust hole 36 on the bottom surface. There is. Power is supplied to the multi-turn antenna 33 from the plasma excitation RF power supply 35 by matching.
This is done via the network 34. Further, the stage on which the wafer W is mounted is connected to the RF power source for bias application from the stage 3
Bias power can be applied from 9 through the matching network 38. In addition to the type shown in FIG. 7, a type in which a spiral antenna is arranged above an insulating top plate 31 is also known as the inductively coupled plasma device.

The helicon wave plasma device circulates an insulating plasma generation chamber with a loop antenna and a solenoid coil to generate a helicon wave which can propagate in a magnetic field at a low frequency, and generates this high density plasma. It is used for. The helicon wave can efficiently give energy to an electron having a thermal velocity slightly smaller than its phase velocity without causing collision and accelerate the electron. This process is called Landau damping.

Although the apparatus developed in connection with the dry etching of LSI has been described above, there are processes for handling a large area substrate in fields other than LSI, such as a liquid crystal display (LCD) and an electroluminescence display. Examples are FPD manufacturing fields such as (ELD) and field emission display (FED). In the field of FPDs, wet etching has been the mainstream in the past when it comes to etching.
Recently, it has been pointed out that it is necessary to gradually shift to dry etching. In the case of FPD, the length of one side is 40-80c
Arrays of fine wiring such as electrodes and horizontal / vertical address lines are formed on a large-area substrate of up to m, but the demand for selection ratio and processing accuracy becomes strict as the array becomes finer and the panel becomes larger. Because it has become.

[0007]

By the way, one of the major problems of the present dry etching apparatus is improvement of uniformity.

In the case of the magnetic field microwave plasma device which is best understood among the above-mentioned high-density plasma devices,
In order to deal with a wafer having a diameter of 8 inches or more, a means for generating a highly uniform magnetic field or microwave electric field in a large etching chamber is required. That is,
Generally, a large and expensive solenoid coil is required to make the magnetic field uniform. For example, one method is to provide a sub coil in addition to the main coil to widen the resonance absorption point (ECR point). ing. On the other hand, in order to make the microwave electric field uniform, complicated mode control is required. As one of the countermeasures, a large number of microwave waveguides are arranged near the inner wall surface of the etching chamber,
A device is known in which a multi-pole magnet is arranged outside and an ECR discharge is generated around the waveguide.

All of these measures lead to the enormous size, weight and cost of the plasma device. However, as the volume of the etching chamber increases, the number of electromagnetic field propagation modes that can stably exist inside the etching chamber also increases.
For example, the 40th Joint Lecture on Applied Physics (199
3rd Spring Annual Meeting) Proceedings Proceedings p. 17, lecture number 30a-
It is stated in X-6 that energy transition between a plurality of stable states causes plasma destabilization.

It is said that the inductively coupled plasma device and the helicon wave plasma device which have been developed in recent years generally have higher uniformity of plasma density than the above-mentioned magnetic field microwave plasma device. This is because the principle of plasma generation in these plasma devices is not resonance absorption as in the magnetic field microwave plasma device, and therefore plasma generation is possible within a relatively wide range. However, in an inductively coupled plasma device, for example, as shown in FIG. 7B, the uniform plasma density region still exists near the center of the chamber, and the plasma density decreases near the inner wall surface. Therefore, the expansion of the uniform plasma density region is naturally limited.

On the other hand, in the case of a helicon wave plasma device,
It is known that the solenoid coil that circulates in the plasma generation chamber has a double structure of an inner coil and an outer coil. By optimizing the ratio of the current values supplied to these inner and outer coils, the ion current density can be improved. Control the distribution,
It is designed for plasma processing of large diameter wafers. However, since the diameter of the plasma generation chamber substantially matches the wavelength of the generated helicon wave, it is still impossible to process the FPD substrate that far exceeds the size of the semiconductor wafer as it is.

As described above, when aiming at the plasma treatment of a large area substrate in the future, if the existing plasma device is simply enlarged in proportion, problems such as an increase in occupied space, an increase in cost, and a decrease in controllability will occur. Depending on the device, proportional expansion itself may not be theoretically possible, and it is extremely difficult to deal with it. Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a plasma processing method capable of realizing high-precision plasma processing using high-density plasma, particularly high-precision dry etching, with a normal size.

[0013]

The plasma method of the present invention is proposed to achieve the above-mentioned object,
A plasma generation chamber, a processing chamber that is separated from the plasma generation chamber and is coaxially connected, and that internally performs a predetermined plasma process on a substrate to be processed; and the plasma generation chamber and the processing chamber. A partition plate which is interposed between the partition plate and a window for opening plasma from the plasma generation chamber into the processing chamber, and is housed in the processing chamber to hold the substrate to be processed facing the partition plate. A plasma processing method for performing a predetermined plasma processing on a substrate to be processed by using a plasma device comprising a substrate stage and a driving means for moving the substrate stage in a plane parallel to the partition plate, Depending on the stage, the substrate to be processed is equal to or more than the thickness of the ion sheath generated on the surface of the substrate to be processed from the partition plate. Is held at a position separated by a very small distance, and the substrate stage is moved by using the drive means, so that the partition plate of the substrate is processed on the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed placed on the substrate stage. This is to change with time the part irradiated with plasma through the window.

[0014]

By the way, the drive means may be a step movement which alternately repeats movement for a fixed distance and stop for a fixed time, or continuous movement for moving in a predetermined direction at a low speed and at a constant speed. It may be done. The power transmission mechanism required for driving is not particularly limited, such as a type in which a screw screw is driven by a motor, a type in which a guide rail and a linear motor are used in combination, or a type having a pneumatic / hydraulic system. It is easy to use a mechanism similar to the XY stage used as the exposure stage of the (reduction projection exposure apparatus).

In particular, when the former step-moving type driving means is adopted, it is convenient to set the opening area of the window portion to be substantially equal to an area obtained by equally dividing the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed. As a plasma processing method using such a plasma device, the movement of the substrate stage by the driving means is performed each time plasma processing is completed for one of the equally divided regions of the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed. The divided areas may be set as one unit and sequentially performed. Although the shape of the window is not particularly limited, a rectangular shape or a rectangular shape is used so that a specific portion of the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed is not irradiated with plasma more than many times or for a long time as compared with other portions. It is desirable that the polygon conform to the above.

The plasma apparatus used in the present invention can be used for all conventionally known processes using plasma, such as plasma CVD or surface modification using plasma, but especially dry etching which mainly proceeds in ion mode. It is extremely effective when used as a device for performing.
In this case, the minute distance between the partition plate and the substrate to be processed is
Anisotropic processing is realized inside the window by setting the thickness so thin that radicals do not wrap around to the back surface of the partition plate. This minute distance is preferably selected to be equal to or less than the thickness of the ion sheath generated on the surface of the substrate to be processed.

Generally, in a high-density plasma apparatus, the interaction between the inner wall of the plasma generation chamber or the processing chamber and the plasma also increases, so that the selection of the wall material is an important key for stable plasma generation. It has been known. Naturally, the selection of the constituent material of the partition plate is also important in the present invention. This partition plate may be made of any one of a conductor, a semiconductor and an insulator. However, with respect to the conductor, it is not a source of generation of metal impurities, and if it is applied to dry etching and has resistance to etching species, there are few choices. For example, SUS steel is not suitable because it can be a source of metal impurities, and therefore aluminum is practically conceivable. On the other hand, the selection of semiconductors and insulators is relatively abundant, and silicon-based materials such as polysilicon, amorphous silicon, SiO, SiN, and SiC, and A
l ₂ O ₃ can be used.

Further, in the present invention, the interaction between the diaphragm and the plasma can be positively utilized. Specifically, at least the surface of this partition plate is made of a radical consuming material. The radicals are typically halogen radicals (X ^* ) such as F ^* and Cl ^* that are often used in semiconductor processes. When the above-mentioned silicon-based material is used as the radical consuming material, typically, the reaction represented by Si + 4X ^* → SiX ₄ effectively causes the halogen radicals on the surface of the partition plate to have a high vapor pressure. It can be converted into a high compound, and the radical generation ratio in plasma can be reduced. The partition plate may be composed of a radical-consumable material as a whole, but it is more convenient to arrange small pieces of the radical-consumable material on the surface of an appropriate structural material, or to coat the radical-consumable material. Can be formed. Particularly in the latter case, it is possible to form the film in-situ by performing CVD in the chamber. It should be noted that the mode control is easier if the partition plate is entirely dielectric.

When dry etching is performed by utilizing such a radical consuming action, excess radicals can be consumed to reduce the ratio of radicals to ions or the ratio of radicals to deposited species to an appropriate level. The shape and base selectivity can be improved.

On the contrary, the partition plate may emit a specific substance by the ion-sputtering action of high density plasma. In a high-density plasma, the dissociation of gas proceeds to a high degree, and in some cases, the deposition species such as carbon-based polymer cannot be sufficiently polymerized, resulting in insufficient side wall protection effect and underlayer selectivity. There is. However, if the side wall protective material can be supplied from the partition plate, excellent anisotropic processing can be performed with a small substrate bias.

[0022]

According to the present invention, only a portion having a uniform plasma density is drawn out through the window portion opened in the partition plate between the plasma generation chamber and the processing chamber, and the plasma irradiation is performed on a portion of the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed. Finally, the plasma treatment of the entire surface to be treated is performed by sequentially repeating the above steps. Therefore, the substrate to be processed is not only the semiconductor wafer but F
Even if it is large like a PD substrate, it is possible to basically use a plasma source having the same size as the existing plasma device, and it is not necessary to change the plasma generation conditions. In addition, since the substrate to be processed is arranged apart from the partition plate by a minute distance equal to or less than the thickness of the ion sheath generated on the surface of the substrate to be processed, a part of the surface to be processed, particularly Simply, the plasma processing performed on the equally divided regions is uniform and has excellent reproducibility. This leads to elimination of excessive overetching and reduction of damage to the underlying material film and reduction of film thickness, particularly when dry etching is performed by applying the present invention. Further, since the radical production ratio in the plasma can be reduced by selecting the constituent material of the partition plate, the anisotropic shape and the underlying layer selectivity can be improved.

[0023]

EXAMPLES Specific examples of the present invention will be described below.

Example 1 In this example, an inductively coupled plasma etching apparatus constructed by applying the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2. FIG. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional view of the present etching apparatus, and FIG. 2 is an enlarged schematic perspective view of the partition plate and the vicinity of the substrate stage.

As shown in FIG. 1, this etching apparatus is roughly divided into a cylindrical plasma generation chamber 1 and a processing chamber 7. Both chambers 1, 7
Are coaxially connected, and most of their wall surfaces are made of a conductive material such as stainless steel. However, a part of the plasma generation chamber 1 in the axial direction is composed of a quartz cylinder 3, and a multi-turn antenna 4 is wound around the outer periphery of the quartz cylinder 3. This multi-turn antenna 4
Power is supplied from the plasma excitation RF power source 6 through the matching network 5. When gas is supplied into the plasma generation chamber 1 from the direction of arrow B through the top plate 2 that also serves as a gas supply pipe and RF power is supplied to the multi-turn antenna 4, inductively coupled plasma P is generated in the chamber. The frequency of the RF power source 6 for plasma excitation is 13.56 MHz here.

The processing chamber 7 is a much larger chamber than the plasma generating chamber 1 described above,
The inside thereof has an exhaust hole 8 by a high vacuum exhaust system (not shown).
It contains a conductive substrate stage 9 which is evacuated to a high vacuum in the direction of arrow A and is electrically insulated from the wall surface. The substrate S to be processed is held on this, and dry etching as a predetermined plasma process is performed. A bias application RF power source 11 for applying a substrate bias to the substrate S to be processed in order to control the energy of ions incident from the inductively coupled plasma P is connected to the substrate stage 9 via a matching network 10. ing. The frequency of the RF power source 11 for bias application is 13.56 MHz here. Further, inside the substrate stage 9, a temperature adjusting means such as a cooling pipe or a heater (not shown) may be incorporated so that the temperature of the substrate to be processed can be adjusted according to the content of the process.

The greatest feature of this apparatus is that a partition plate 12 having a window 13 is provided between the plasma generating chamber 1 and the processing chamber 7, and the substrate stage 9 is driven by the driving means 1.
4 is connected. This drive means 14
Although it is possible to use the power of a linear motor to move the substrate stage 9 along a predetermined guide rail, here, an XY stage mechanism which is often used as an exposure stage of a stepper is adopted. These parts will be described in more detail with reference to FIG.

A rectangular window portion 13 is provided at the center of the partition plate 12.
Is opened. The center of the window 13 is aligned with the axis of the plasma generation chamber 1. That is, the window 13 faces the uniform plasma density region in the center of the chamber, and plays the role of drawing out uniform plasma to the processing chamber 7 side. The opening area of the window 13 is
The surface to be processed of the substrate S to be processed is set to be substantially equal to the equally divided regions a to h obtained by equally dividing the surface to be processed (here, into 8 equal parts), and moreover, the gap G between the partition plate 12 and the substrate to be processed S is set. Is
It is set smaller than the thickness T _I of the ion sheath I. In the ion sheath I, positive ions are vertically incident on the substrate due to the DC electric field, so most of the ions passing through the window 13 are vertical incident components. With these settings,
The plasma diffusion to the back side of the partition plate 13 is prevented, and the dry etching is performed while making the equally divided portion of the surface to be processed located directly under the window 13 almost exactly one unit. The thickness T ₁ of the ion sheath in the inductively coupled plasma etching device depends on the gas used and the discharge conditions, but is usually
It is about several tens of μm to several mm.

The substrate S to be processed is moved so that the next equally divided region is located immediately below the window 13 every time the dry etching for one of the equally divided regions a to h is completed. The mechanism that enables such movement is the XY stage 15. The XY stage 15 operates the upper sliding member 15a and the lower sliding member 15b, which are in contact with each other on a slope, or both of them to operate the substrate S to be processed XY while keeping the gap G constant. It is a mechanism to move it in the plane. The moving direction may be a linear direction, a zigzag direction, a spiral direction, or the like as long as the dry etching of the entire surface to be processed can be completed with as few flow lines as possible. In the example shown in FIG. 2, for example, area names are a → b → c → d → e → f → g → h or a → h → g.
Dry etching in accordance with the order of → b → c → f → e → d can be considered.

In this etching apparatus, the design and conditions of the existing apparatus have not been changed with respect to the part relating to the principle of plasma generation. Therefore, it is possible to cope with dry etching of a large-sized substrate to be processed while having the high stability and controllability which are advantages of a compact plasma source.

Example 2 In this example, the inductively coupled plasma described in Example 1 was used.
A gate film, which is a part of the manufacturing process of the cathode array of the FED, was formed by using an etching device.

The size of the surface to be processed of the substrate S to be processed used in this embodiment is a rectangle of 60 cm × 80 cm. The size of the window portion 13 is a rectangle of 15 cm × 20 cm, from which the inductively coupled plasma P with uniformity of ± 5% or less is extracted to perform 16-division etching of the surface to be processed. The gap G was set to 1 mm.

The dry etching process is as shown in FIGS. First, as shown in FIG. 3, a silicon substrate 20 having a thickness of 1.5 is formed as an insulating film.
A SiO ₂ film 21 having a thickness of about μm was formed, and a W-polycide film 24 serving as a gate film was deposited thereon with a thickness of about 0.3 μm. The W- polycide film lower layer side impurity-containing polysilicon film 22 of 24, the upper layer side is tungsten silicide (WSi _x) layer 23. Further, on the W-polycide film 24, a resist pattern 25 in which openings 26 having a diameter of about 1 μm are regularly arranged is formed.

Next, the substrate S to be processed is set on the substrate stage 9 of the inductively coupled plasma etching apparatus described above, and each of the 16 divided regions is sequentially arranged using the XY stage 15 at a distance of 1 mm directly below the window portion 13. While moving to the position,
The W-polycide film 24 was dry-etched using the resist pattern 25 as a mask. An example of etching conditions is shown below.

Cl ₂ flow rate 100 SCCM O ₂ flow rate 15 SCCM Gas pressure 0.5 Pa RF source power 1800 W (13.56 M
Hz) RF bias power 10 W (13.56 M)
Hz) Substrate temperature 20 ° C. (water cooling) The thickness T _I of the ion sheath formed on the surface of the substrate S to be processed under the above discharge conditions is about 5 mm. Here, since the gap G is set to 1 mm and the Cl-based gas in which the etching proceeds mainly in the ion mode is used, each of the 16 divided regions is set as an accurate unit of etching, and the window portion is formed. It was etched by a uniform inductively coupled plasma P extracted from No. 13. As a result, the opening 24a having an anisotropic shape could be formed in the W-polycide film 24 in all 16 divided regions, as shown in FIG.

Example 3 In this example, a recess 12 was formed as a continuation of the process described in Example 2 using the partition plate 12 having a polysilicon film formed on the surface thereof.

That is, the substrate S to be processed in the state shown in FIG. 4 was similarly sequentially etched by using 16 divided regions as one unit. An example of etching conditions is shown below.

C ₂ F ₆ flow rate 100 SCCM Ar flow rate 100 SCCM gas pressure 0.13 Pa source power 200 W (13.56)
MHz) RF bias power 150 W (13.56)
MHz) Substrate stage temperature 20 ° C. (water cooling) The state of the progress of this etching process is schematically shown in FIG. The main etching species in this etching is CF _x ⁺ , and the selectivity with respect to the underlying silicon substrate 20 is that the carbon (C) component derived from the C ₂ F ₆ gas is polymerized.
Achieved by deposition. F ^* is a chemical species that is desired to be reduced in this etching because it causes deterioration of anisotropic shape and underlying selectivity, but gas dissociation proceeds to a high degree in high density plasma such as inductively coupled plasma P. , Produce in large quantities. However, due to the presence of Si on the surface of the partition plate 12, F ^* was promptly removed from the system in the form of SiF _x , and the C / F ratio of the plasma was appropriately maintained. As a result, as shown in FIG. 5, the recess 21a having a good anisotropic shape could be formed. Moreover, since the amount of over-etching can be minimized by using the uniform plasma, the erosion and damage of the silicon substrate 20 were avoided.

After that, the resist pattern 25 is removed, and a metal film is deposited on the entire surface by sputtering.
Configured a microgun. In this metal film deposition process,
The diameter of the opening 24a is gradually reduced due to the overhang of the metal film, and accordingly, the amount of the metal film deposited inside the recess 21a is gradually reduced, whereby the conical cathode is self-aligned. It is formed. This microgun is typically arranged in an area of about 0.1 mm ² with 1000 or more of three primary colors arranged to form one pixel, and several thousand to several million of these pixels are arranged. Completed the FED screen.

The present invention has been described above based on the three embodiments, but the present invention is not limited to these embodiments. For example, in each of the above-described embodiments, the apparatus and method for sequentially dry-etching the equally-divided region of the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed have been described. However, the substrate to be processed is continuously moved at a gentle constant speed. The method may be adopted. In this case, as a measure for making the plasma treatment uniform, the width of the window portion is made narrow to the extent that the plasma extraction efficiency is not extremely deteriorated, or the opening area of the window portion is kept wide and the substrate to be processed is kept. It is conceivable to sufficiently secure the processing time at the substrate edge by overrunning the window with respect to the window.

Further, although only the inductively coupled plasma device has been described in the above embodiments, the present invention can be applied to a magnetic field microwave plasma device, a helicon wave plasma device and other high density plasma devices. The substrate to be processed is not limited to the FED and may be a semiconductor wafer or an LCD substrate. Further, the plasma treatment performed in the present invention is not limited to dry etching, and may be CVD. Other than this, all design rules, specific etching conditions, and the like can be changed as appropriate.

[0042]

As is apparent from the above description, if the present invention is applied, even if an existing small plasma source is used,
A large area plasma treatment that is uniform and has excellent reproducibility is possible. As a result, it is possible to manufacture a highly integrated semiconductor device using a semiconductor wafer having a large diameter exceeding 8 inches, or
It is possible to manufacture flat panel displays such as ED and LDC with excellent economical efficiency, yield, and reliability.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional view showing a configuration example of an inductively coupled plasma etching apparatus used in the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an enlarged perspective view of an essential part showing the vicinity of a partition plate and a substrate stage of the above inductively coupled plasma device.

FIG. 3 is a view showing an FED manufacturing process to which the present invention is applied.
FIG. 3 is a schematic cross-sectional view showing a state in which a SiO ₂ film, a W-polycide film, and a resist pattern are sequentially formed on a silicon substrate.

FIG. 4 is a schematic cross-sectional view showing a state where the W-polycide film of FIG. 3 is anisotropically etched.

5 is a schematic cross-sectional view showing a state where the SiO ₂ film of FIG. 4 is anisotropically etched.

6 is a schematic cross-sectional view showing an etching mechanism when the partition plate of the inductively coupled plasma etching apparatus of FIG. 1 is made of a radical consuming material.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory view of a conventional inductively coupled plasma device,
FIG. 6A is a schematic cross-sectional view thereof, and FIG. 6B is a plasma density distribution map corresponding thereto.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 Plasma Generation Chamber 3 Quartz Cylinder 4 Multi-turn Antenna 6 Plasma Excitation RF Power Supply 7 Processing Chamber 9 Substrate Stage 12 Partition Plate 13 Window 15 XY Stage 16 Equal Division Area 21 (of Substrate S) 21 SiO ₂ Film 24 Polycide Membrane 25 Resist Pattern S Processed Substrate G G (Between Separator 13 and Unprocessed Substrate S) P P Inductively Coupled Plasma

Claims (6)

(57) [Claims] 1. A plasma generation chamber, a processing chamber which is separated from the plasma generation chamber and is coaxially connected to each other, and which internally performs a predetermined plasma processing on a substrate to be processed, and the plasma generation chamber. A partition plate which is interposed between the processing chamber and has a window portion for drawing plasma from the plasma generation chamber into the processing chamber; A plasma processing method for performing a predetermined plasma processing on a substrate to be processed by using a plasma device including a substrate stage that holds the plate oppositely and a driving unit that moves the substrate stage in a plane parallel to the partition plate. Therefore, the thickness of the ion sheath generated by the substrate stage from the partition plate to the substrate to be processed is equal to that of the ion sheath. It is preferably held at a position separated by a minute distance which is not more than that, and by moving the substrate stage by using the driving means, on the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed placed on the substrate stage. A plasma processing method of changing a region irradiated with plasma through a window of the partition plate with time. 2. The plasma processing according to claim 1, wherein the window portion has an opening area selected so as to extract only a portion having substantially uniform plasma density from the plasma generated in the plasma generation chamber. Method. 3. The opening area is set to be approximately equal to an area obtained by equally dividing the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed, and the movement of the substrate stage by the driving means is one of equally divided regions of the surface to be processed of the substrate to be processed. 3. The plasma processing method according to claim 2, wherein the equal division region is sequentially treated as one unit each time the plasma treatment for the above is completed. 4. The plasma processing method according to claim 1, wherein dry etching is performed as the predetermined plasma processing. 5. The dry etching is performed by forming at least the surface of the partition plate using a radical consuming material.
The plasma processing method according to claim 4, wherein the plasma processing method is performed while reducing the radical generation ratio in the plasma based on the radical consuming action of the partition plate. 6. The plasma processing method according to claim 5, wherein the radical consuming material is a silicon-based material.