JPH0263112A - Resist treatment apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To restrain a dust particle from being produced inside an apparatus as far as possible, to reduce a defective product and to enhance a yield by a method wherein the surface of individual wafer-carrier loading stages installed at wafers is coated with a resin. CONSTITUTION:At least the surface of individual wafer-carrier loading stages 10, 40, 70 of a sender 1, a buffer 4 and a receiver 7 is coated with a resin such as a fluroresin, polyamide, polyimide or the like whose heat resistance, shock resistance, wear resistance and the like are excellent. A wafer is taken out by a conveyance mechanism 11 from a wafer carrier of the sender 1; it is treated one after another by a dehydration baking operation, a cooling operation, a resist coating operation and a prebaking operation; it is housed inside a wafer carrier of the receiver 7. During these operations, it is treated in a high dust-free state.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to semiconductor manufacturing equipment, and particularly to a resist processing equipment that automatically performs resist coating, development, etc.

[Prior Art] A photoresist processing process mainly consists of a series of steps such as resist coating, pre-bake → exposure → development → post-bake, and such processing equipment includes a coater that combines resist coating, Debite region bake and bre-bake; A developer that combines development and post-bake,
Furthermore, there is one in which such a coater and developer are connected by a line, and an interface section with an exposure device is provided in the middle.

In such in-line processing equipment, a carrier containing several dozen semiconductor wafers is placed on a wafer supply unit called a sender, and the wafers are transferred one by one from the sender to processing equipment such as resist coating, placement, and baking equipment. Convey sequentially. The processed wafers are then sequentially stored in empty carriers placed on the receiver. In addition, a buffer is provided in which the wafer is temporarily placed in order to adjust the difference in processing time between each processing device.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] By the way, generally in the photoresist treatment process, a scrubbing process is performed as a pretreatment process (as a post-treatment of the film forming process) in order to obtain a coating film free of defects such as foreign objects and pinholes. Foreign matter on the wafer surface is removed in advance. However,
In conventional photoresist processing equipment, the surface material of the sender, receiver, or buffer mounting table on which the wafer carrier is placed is alumina, so when the carrier is placed on the surface, the surface is scratched and metal powder is generated. If this metal powder scatters and adheres to the wafer surface, a good resist coating film cannot be obtained, leading to the occurrence of defective products and a decrease in yield.

The present invention has been made to solve these conventional problems, and it is an object of the present invention to provide a resist processing apparatus in which the attachment of foreign matter to a wafer during the processing process is minimized.

[Means for Solving the Problems] A resist processing apparatus of the present invention that achieves the above object is a resist processing apparatus that includes a resist coating line and/or a resist development line, and includes at least a surface that contacts a wafer carrier. It is characterized by having a wafer carrier mounting table made of resin coating.

[Function] The surface of each wafer carrier mounting table installed on the wafer is coated with resin, so even if the wafer carrier is mounted manually or with a robot arm, regardless of the material of the wafer carrier, the impact will not be affected. The line can be dust-free without being scratched or generating metal powder.

[Example] Hereinafter, an example in which the present invention is applied to a coater (coating line) will be described with reference to the drawings. ・Figure 1 is a diagram showing the structure of the coater, and there are two sender 1
and a baking device connected in series thereto2. A cooling device 3 for cooling the wafer after baking, a buffer 4 for temporarily placing the wafer, a coating device 5 for forming a resist film on the wafer surface, and pre-baking devices 6 and 2
It consists of two receivers 7 and a front operation panel 8.

As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the sender 1 includes a wafer carrier mounting table 10 for installing a wafer carrier 9 containing a large number of unprocessed wafers W, and a wafer carrier mounting table 10 for taking out unprocessed wafers one by one from the wafer carrier 9. A conveyance mechanism such as a conveyor belt 11 for conveying to the baking device 2 is provided.

The baking device 2 is, for example, a deviation baking device for previously removing moisture and/or hydroxyl groups on the wafer surface in an unprocessed wafer in order to improve the adhesion between the wafer and the resist 4, and is equipped with a hot plate, for example, and is a direct method or Heat treatment at 200°C to 300°C can be performed using a proximity method.

The cooling device 3 is a device for lowering the temperature of the wafer heated to high temperature by the baking device 2 to a temperature suitable for resist coating. to cool down.

As shown in FIG. 4, the buffer 4 is a station for adjusting the time lag between the deviation bake and the subsequent resist coating, and the buffer carrier is placed on a mounting table 40 equipped with an up-down mechanism. A cooled wafer is temporarily stored in this buffer carrier 9'. This buffer 4 is pass-through (just allows the wafer to pass through) in response to changes in processing conditions such as baking.
The function can be changed to

In this embodiment, a spin coater is used as the coating device 5, and after dropping the resist onto the wafer on the chuck, the wafer is rotated at several hundred to several thousand revolutions/min to form a uniform resist film on the wafer. Let it form.

Although not shown, the bre-bake device 6 is equipped with a hot plate similar to the bake device 2, and heats the wafer after resist coating to about 100°C to evaporate the residual solvent in the resist and improve the adhesion between the coated film and the wafer. Strengthen.

The receiver 7 has the same configuration as the sender 1 as shown in FIG. 5, and transports the resist-coated wafer W to the wafer carrier mounting table 70 on which the empty wafer carrier 9 is placed and the empty wafer carrier. It includes a transport mechanism 71 for
Furthermore, it can be connected to an exposure device (not shown) via an interface section.

Furthermore, each wafer carrier mounting table 10, 40, 70 of the sender 1, buffer 4, and receiver 7 has at least its surface made of a resin with excellent heat resistance, impact resistance, abrasion resistance, etc., such as fluororesin, polyamide, or polyimide. Coated. When a wafer carrier made of AM or the like is placed on such a resin-coated mounting table, it is hard to be scratched and does not generate dust due to impact.

Therefore, in the resist processing apparatus configured as described above, the wafer is taken out from the wafer carrier of the sender 1 by the transport mechanism 11 by operating the operation panel 8, and the wafers are sequentially subjected to the following processes: dehydration baking, cooling, resist coating, and pre-baking. The wafer is processed and stored in the wafer carrier of the receiver 7, during which time the processing can be performed in a highly dust-free state.

Although the coating line has been described above, it goes without saying that the present invention can be applied to development lines and other processing equipment.

[Effects of the Invention] As is clear from the above description, in the resist processing apparatus of the present invention, the generation of dust within the apparatus is suppressed as much as possible, thereby reducing the generation of defective products and improving the yield. Can be done.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a resist processing apparatus to which the present invention is applied, FIG. 2 is a partial perspective view of the same processing apparatus, FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an embodiment of a wafer carrier mounting table, and FIG. FIG. 5 is a partial perspective view of the same processing apparatus as FIG. 1, and FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an embodiment of the wafer carrier mounting table. - Sender 2...Bake device 3...Cooling device 4...Buffer 5...Coater 6... ...Bake device 7 ...Receiver 8 ...Operation panel 9 ...
・Wafer carrier 10.40.70...Wafer carrier mounting table 1
1.71...Wafer transport mechanism Figure 1

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A resist processing apparatus including a resist coating line and/or a resist development line, the apparatus comprising a wafer carrier mounting table whose surface in contact with a wafer carrier is coated with a resin.