Material or article handling – Apparatus for moving material between zones having different... – For carrying standarized mechanical interface type
Patent
1987-04-20
1989-02-07
Werner, Frank E.
Material or article handling
Apparatus for moving material between zones having different...
For carrying standarized mechanical interface type
414608, 414618, 414733, 414742, B65G 6500
Patent
active
048028096
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
SEALED STANDARD INTERFACE APPARATUS; Inventors: George Allen Maney, Andrew William O'Sullivan, W. George Faraco; U.S. Pat. No. 4,674,939, issued June 23, 1987 which is commonly assigned to the assignee herein.
BOX DOOR ACTUATED RETAINER; Inventors: George Allen Maney, Andrew William O'Sullivan, W. George Faraco; Ser. No. 686,443; Filed: Dec. 24, 1984 which is commonly assigned to assignee herein.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to manipulating apparatus for standardized mechanical interface systems for reducing particle contamination and more particularly to apparatus transferring cassettes containing articles to be processed into and out of sealed containers suitable for use in semiconductor processing equipment to prevent particle contamination.
A standardized mechanical interface (SMIF) apparatus has been proposed to reduce particle contamination by significantly reducing particle fluxes onto wafers. This end is accomplished by mechanically ensuring that during transport, storage and processing of the wafers, the gaseous media (such as air or nitrogen) surrounding the wafers is essentially stationary relative to the wafers and by ensuring that particles from the ambient outside environment do not enter the immediate internal wafer environment.
Control of particulate contamination is imperative for cost effective, high-yielding and profitable manufacturing of VLSI circuits. Because design rules increasingly call for smaller and smaller lines and spaces, it is necessary to exert greater and greater control on the number of particles and to remove particles with smaller and smaller diameters.
Some contamination particles cause process defects, such as incomplete etching in spaces between lines leading to an unwanted electrical bridge. In addition to such physical process defects, other contamination particles may cause electrical failure due to induced ionization or trapping centers in gate dielectrics or junctions.
Modern processing equipment must be concerned with particle sizes which range from below 0.01 micrometers to above 200 micrometers. Particles with these sizes can be very damaging in semiconductor processing. Typical semiconductor processes today employ geometries which are 1 micrometer and under. Unwanted contamination particles which have geometries measuring greater than 0.1 micrometer substantially interfere with 1 micrometer geometry semiconductor devices. The trend, of course, is to have smaller and smaller semiconductor processing geometries.
In typical processing environments today, "clean rooms" are established in which, through filtering and other techniques, attempts are made to remove particles having geometries of 0.03 micrometer and above. There is a need, however, to improve the processing environment. The conventional "clean room" cannot be maintained as particle free as desired. It is virtually impossible to maintain conventional clean rooms free of particles of a 0.01 micrometer size and below.
The main sources of particulate contamination are personnel, equipment, and chemicals. Particles given off by personnel are transmitted through the environment and through physical contact or migration onto the wafer surface. People, by shedding of skin flakes, for example, are a significant source of particles that are easily ionized and cause defects. Although clean room garments reduce particle emissions they do not fully contain the emissions. It has been found that as many as 6000 particles per minute are emitted into an adjacent one cubic foot of space by a fully suited operator.
To control contamination particles, the trend in the industry is to build more elaborate and expensive clean rooms with HEPA and ULPA recirculating air systems. Filter efficiencies of 99.999% and up to ten complete air exchanges per minute are required to obtain an acceptable level of cleanliness.
To minimize process defects, processing equipment manufacturers must prevent machine generated particles from reaching the wafers, and suppli
REFERENCES:
patent: 3262593 (1966-07-01), Hainer
patent: 4527446 (1985-07-01), Borodin
patent: 4674936 (1987-06-01), Bonora
patent: 4674939 (1987-06-01), Maney et al.
patent: 4676709 (1987-06-01), Bonora et al.
Bonora Anthony C.
O'Sullivan Andrew W.
Asyst Technologies
Bucci David A.
Werner Frank E.
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