Methods for purging a substrate carrier at a factory interface

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10903102-B2
Application number	US-201916667025-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 29, 2019
Priority date	Oct 24, 2014
Publication date	Jan 26, 2021
Grant date	Jan 26, 2021

Abstract

A method of purging a substrate carrier at a load port includes: opening a door of a substrate carrier that is delivered to a load port; spraying the substrate carrier with a gas flow responsive to the opening the door; mapping substrates within the substrate carrier to generate a substrate map; determining a process purge state based on the substrate map; and activating one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays and one or more curtain nozzle arrays using a predefined spray status configuration for the process purge state.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of purging a substrate carrier at a load port, the method comprising:
opening a door of a substrate carrier that is delivered to a load port;
spraying the substrate carrier with a gas flow responsive to the opening the door;
mapping substrates within the substrate carrier to generate a substrate map;
determining a process purge state based on the substrate map; and
activating one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays and one or more curtain nozzle arrays using a predefined spray status configuration for the process purge state.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
switching the predefined spray status configuration to a load spray status configuration as substrates are added to the substrate carrier;
updating the substrate map as substrates are added to the substrate carrier, to generate an updated substrate map; and
determining a new process purge state based on the updated substrate map.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
switching the predefined spray status configuration to an unload spray status configuration as substrates are removed from the substrate carrier;
updating the substrate map as substrates are removed from the substrate carrier, to generate an updated substrate map; and
determining a new process purge state based on the updated substrate map.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays and the one or more curtain nozzle arrays comprises using a second predefined spray status configuration for the new process purge state.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays comprises spraying gas into the substrate carrier between substrates within the substrate carrier.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein activating the one or more curtain nozzle arrays comprises spraying gas across an opening of the substrate carrier.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein activating the one or more curtain nozzle arrays comprises spraying gas vertically across an opening of the substrate carrier from a curtain nozzle array disposed horizontally across a top side of an opening of the substrate carrier.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays comprises dynamically adjusting, during spraying, an angle of the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays with respect to sides of the substrate carrier.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the angle ranges between zero and 45 degrees.

10. A method of purging a substrate carrier at a load port, the method comprising:
opening a door of a substrate carrier that is delivered to a load port;
spraying the substrate carrier with a gas flow responsive to the opening the door;
determining a process purge state depending on a number and location of substrates positioned within one or more zones of the substrate carrier; and
activating one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays and one or more curtain nozzle arrays using a predefined spray status configuration for the process purge state.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays comprises dynamically adjusting, during spraying, an angle of the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays with respect to sides of the substrate carrier.

12. The method of claim 10 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays comprises:
adjusting a first rate of spray of a first inter-substrate nozzle array aimed relative to a first side of the substrate carrier; and
adjusting a second rate of spray of a second inter-substrate nozzle array aimed relative to a second side of the substrate carrier.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the first rate of spray is different from the second rate of spray.

14. The method of claim 12 , wherein activating the one or more curtain nozzle arrays comprises spraying gas from a first curtain nozzle array at a third rate of spray that is different from the first rate of spray and the second rate of spray.

15. A method of purging a substrate carrier at a load port, the method comprising:
opening a door of a substrate carrier that is delivered to a load port;
spraying the substrate carrier with a gas flow responsive to the opening the door;
mapping substrates within one or more zones of the substrate carrier to generate a substrate map;
determining a process purge state based on the substrate map and based on one of presence or absence of an end effector of a factory interface robot within the substrate carrier; and
activating one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays and one or more curtain nozzle arrays using a predefined spray status configuration for the process purge state.

16. The method of claim 15 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays comprises dynamically adjusting, during spraying, an angle of the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays with respect to sides of the substrate carrier.

17. The method of claim 15 , further comprising:
switching the predefined spray status configuration to a load spray status configuration as substrates are added to the substrate carrier;
updating the substrate map as substrates are added to the substrate carrier, to generate an updated substrate map; and
determining a new process purge state based on the updated substrate map.

18. The method of claim 17 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays and the one or more curtain nozzle arrays comprises using a second predefined spray status configuration for the new process purge state.

19. The method of claim 15 , further comprising:
switching the predefined spray status configuration to an unload spray status configuration as substrates are removed from the substrate carrier;
updating the substrate map as substrates are removed from the substrate carrier, to generate an updated substrate map; and
determining a new process purge state based on the updated substrate map.

20. The method of claim 15 , wherein activating the one or more inter-substrate nozzle arrays comprises:
adjusting a first rate of spray of a first inter-substrate nozzle array aimed relative to a first side of the substrate carrier;
adjusting a second rate of spray of a second inter-substrate nozzle array aimed relative to a second side of the substrate carrier; and
wherein activating the one or more curtain nozzle arrays comprises spraying gas from a first curtain nozzle array at a third rate of spray different from the first rate of spray and the second rate of spray.

Assignees

• Applied Materials Inc

Inventors

• Iyer Subramaniam V
• Srichurnam Dharma Ratnam
• Holeyannavar Devendrappa
• Macleod Douglas
• Carpenter Kenneth
• Kumar Naveen
• Rao Vivek R
• Pannese Patrick

Classifications

• H10P72/3406

  involving removal of lid, door or cover · CPC title

• H10P72/1924

  characterised by atmosphere control · CPC title

• H10P72/0402 Primary

  Apparatus for fluid treatment (H10P72/0441, H10P72/0448 take precedence) · CPC title

• H10P72/1921 Primary

  characterised by substrate supports · CPC title

• H01L21/67017

  Electricity · mapped topic