Photography – Fluid-treating apparatus – Fluid application to one side only of photographic medium
Reexamination Certificate
2000-05-31
2001-09-18
Rutledge, D. (Department: 2851)
Photography
Fluid-treating apparatus
Fluid application to one side only of photographic medium
C414S940000, C414S941000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06290405
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a substrate processing apparatus, for example, for performing coating processing of a resist solution, developing processing, and the like for a substrate such as a semiconductor wafer, a glass substrate for a liquid crystal display, or the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
In photolithography in a semiconductor device fabricating process, a resist is applied to the front face of a semiconductor wafer (hereinafter referred to as a wafer), the applied resist is subjected to exposure processing in accordance with a predetermined pattern and then developing processing, whereby the predetermined pattern of resist film is formed. Such a series of processing is performed by a system in which an aligner is connected to a coating and developing apparatus.
FIG. 13
is a plan view showing a conventional example of such an apparatus, and a substrate cassette C housing
25
substrates, for example, semiconductor wafers is carried into a cassette stage
1
of a cassette station
100
. A coating block
110
and a developing block
120
are connected to the cassette station
100
in this order, and an aligner
140
is connected to the developing block
120
with an interface station
130
between them.
A wafer W in the cassette C on the cassette stage
1
is taken out by a delivery arm not illustrated, and then sent to the coating block
110
via a delivery table
10
. In the coating block
110
, the wafer W is coated with the resist in a coating unit
11
, and then transferred by the route of a main arm A
1
→a delivery table
12
→a main arm A
2
in the developing block
120
→a delivery table
13
→the interface station
130
→a carrying-in stage
14
of an aligner
140
→a delivery arm
15
→an exposure section
16
, and exposed. Incidentally, in the coating block
110
, before and after the coating of the resist, pre-processing and post-processing are respectively performed in a shelf unit
17
a.
The exposed wafer W is transferred to the developing block
120
by the reverse route via a carrying-out stage
18
of the aligner
140
, developed in a developing unit
19
, and then transferred by the route of the main arm A
2
→the delivery table
12
→the main arm A
1
→the delivery table
10
→the cassette C. In the developing block
120
, before and after the developing processing, pre-processing and post-processing are respectively performed in a shelf unit
17
b.
Incidentally, since the processing speed of the aligner
140
is increasing in the aforesaid coating and developing apparatus, the processing number of wafers is required to be
150
or more in coating processing and developing processing, and hence a system provided with three coating units
11
and four developing units
14
and also provided with three antireflection film forming units each for forming an antireflection film as pre-processing of resist coating is under consideration.
In this case, it is considered that a pre-processing block is provided, for example, between the cassette station
100
and the coating block
110
, and the antireflection film forming units and a main arm for transferring the wafer W, for example, are provided there.
Incidentally, in the aforesaid coating and developing apparatus, in some cases, an operator performs work for the units and the like inside the apparatus such as confirmation of the operations of the main arm A
1
and the like, maintenance of the shelf units
17
a
and
17
b,
cleaning of the carrying-in stage
14
and the carrying-out stage
18
of the aligner
140
, and the like. Meanwhile, in the aforesaid apparatus, spaces between the units in each block are eliminated as much as possible for the purpose of downsizing the apparatus and reducing occupied floor space. Accordingly, a space for maintenance by the operator is not secured in each block. As a result, the operator needs to do the aforesaid work from the outside of the apparatus, thereby causing disadvantages that the work is difficult, and thus maintenance and the like take a lot of time.
Further, in the aforesaid layout in which the pre-processing block is disposed between the cassette station
100
and the coating block
110
, the distance between the cassette stage
1
and the aligner
140
is long. Thus, there is a disadvantage that efficiency of utilization of a clean room is deteriorated in the layout in which a depth from the cassette stage
1
is long since a transfer path for an automatic transfer robot for transferring the cassette C to the cassette stage
1
is formed along the cassette stage
1
and the transfer path is in the clean room.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is made under these circumstances, and its object is to provide a substrate processing apparatus capable of securing a working space in a processing station while downsizing the processing station.
To this end, a substrate processing apparatus of the present invention is characterized by comprising: a cassette station including a mounting section for mounting a substrate cassette housing a plurality of substrates thereon and delivery means for receiving and sending the substrate from/to the substrate cassette mounted on the mounting section; and a processing station, connected to the cassette station, for processing the substrate transferred by the delivery means,
the processing station comprising: a first processing unit in which a plurality of processing sections are arranged in a direction orthogonal to the lengthwise direction of the cassette station; a second processing unit in which a plurality of processing sections are arranged so as to face the processing sections composing the first processing unit; first substrate transfer means, disposed at a position facing onto the row of the first processing unit, for receiving and sending the substrate from/to the processing sections composing the first processing unit; and second substrate transfer means, disposed at a position facing onto the row of the second processing unit, for receiving and sending the substrate from/to the processing sections composing the second processing unit, and characterized in that
a working space is formed in an area between the first processing unit and the second processing unit and adjacent to the cassette station in the processing station.
In this case, the processing station may be structured to include the first processing unit in which three or more processing sections are arranged in the direction orthogonal to the lengthwise direction of the cassette station, the second processing unit in which three or more processing sections are arranged so as to face the processing sections composing the first processing unit, two or more first substrate transfer means disposed at positions facing onto the row of the first processing unit, for receiving and sending the substrate from/to the processing sections composing the first processing unit, and two or more second substrate transfer means disposed at positions facing onto the row of the second processing unit, for receiving and sending the substrate from/to the processing sections composing the second processing unit.
In such a invention, a working space is formed in an area between the first processing unit and the second processing unit and adjacent to the cassette station, thus allowing an operator to get into the working space and perform work such as maintenance and the like of the inside of the processing station, thereby facilitating the work.
The processing station may be structured to include a delivery table for the substrate for delivering the substrate between the first substrate transfer means and the second substrate transfer means. Further, the first processing unit and the second processing unit, for example, are to perform coating processing of a coating solution for the substrate, and more specifically, the apparatus comprises an interface station, which is allowed to connect with an aligner provided on the opposite side to the cassette sta
Rader Fishman & Grauer
Rutledge D.
Tokyo Electron Limited
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