Substrate processing apparatus and substrate processing method

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12276455-B2
Application number	US-202117464367-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 1, 2021
Priority date	Sep 4, 2020
Publication date	Apr 15, 2025
Grant date	Apr 15, 2025

Abstract

A substrate processing apparatus for drying a substrate by substituting a liquid film of a drying liquid formed on the substrate with a supercritical fluid incudes: a pressure container configured to accommodate the substrate on which the liquid film is formed; a discharge line configured to discharge a fluid inside the pressure container; a depressurizing valve provided in a middle of the discharge line; and a concentration measurement part configured to measure a concentration of vapor of the drying liquid in the fluid flowing through the discharge line, wherein the concentration measurement part is provided on a downstream side of the depressurizing valve of the discharge line and measures the concentration of the drying liquid in the fluid depressurized by the depressurizing valve.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A substrate processing apparatus for drying a substrate by substituting a liquid film of a drying liquid formed on the substrate with a supercritical fluid, the substrate processing apparatus comprising:
a pressure container configured to accommodate the substrate on which the liquid film is formed;
a discharge line configured to discharge a fluid inside the pressure container;
a depressurizing valve provided in a middle of the discharge line;
a concentration measurement part configured to measure a concentration of the drying liquid in the fluid flowing through the discharge line;
a storage configured to store temporal change data of the concentration of the drying liquid measured every unit time by the concentration measurement part; and
a drying termination detector configured to detect termination of drying the substrate based on the temporal change data stored in the storage,
wherein the concentration measurement part is provided on a downstream side of the depressurizing valve of the discharge line and measures the concentration of the drying liquid in the fluid depressurized by the depressurizing valve.

2. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the storage stores reference data of the temporal change data in advance,
wherein the reference data is data in which an elapsed time from starting a fluid discharge by the discharge line and the concentration of the drying liquid measured by the concentration measurement part are associated with each other, and
wherein the drying termination detector sets a termination detection time and a termination detection concentration for detecting the termination of drying the substrate from the reference data, detects the concentration of the drying liquid when the elapsed time has reached the termination detection time during the drying of the substrate, and detects the termination of drying the substrate by detecting that the detected concentration of the drying liquid is equal to or lower than the termination detection concentration.

3. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 2 , further comprising a drying abnormality detector configured to detect abnormality of drying the substrate based on the temporal change data stored in the storage.

4. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 3 , wherein the drying abnormality detector detects a reaching time when the concentration of the drying liquid reaches a peak concentration in the reference data, detects the concentration of the drying liquid at a time when the elapsed time reaches the reaching time during the drying of the substrate, and detects abnormality in an amount of the liquid film by comparing the detected concentration of the drying liquid with the peak concentration.

5. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 4 , wherein the drying abnormality detector sets an abnormality detection time and an abnormality detection concentration for the substrate from the reference data, detects the concentration of the drying liquid at a time when the elapsed time reaches the abnormality detection time during the drying of the substrate, and detects abnormality in a drying time by comparing the detected concentration of the drying liquid with the abnormality detection concentration.

6. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 5 , further comprising a reference data creator configured to create the reference data based on the amount of the liquid film of the drying liquid formed on a top surface of the substrate in advance, a volume of the pressure container, an internal pressure of the pressure container, and a discharge flow rate of the fluid from the pressure container.

7. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 6 , wherein the reference data creator corrects the reference data by calculating a moving time of the fluid from the pressure container to the concentration measurement part based on a volume of the discharge line.

8. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 7 , further comprising:
an opening/closing valve provided in a middle of the discharge line; and
a leakage detector configured to measure the concentration of the drying liquid by the concentration measurement part provided on a downstream side of the opening/closing valve in a state in which the opening/closing valve closes a flow path of the discharge line, and configured to detect leakage of the opening/closing valve from the measured concentration of the drying liquid.

9. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 8 , further comprising:
a concentration measurement line branching from the discharge line on the downstream side of the depressurizing valve of the discharge line, the concentration measurement part being provided in a middle of the concentration measurement line; and
a heater configured to heat the concentration measurement line.

10. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 2 , further comprising a reference data creator configured to create the reference data by averaging a plurality of pieces of previously measured temporal change data.

11. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 2 , further comprising a reference data creator configured to create the reference data based on an amount of the liquid film of the drying liquid formed on a top surface of the substrate in advance, a volume of the pressure container, an internal pressure of the pressure container, and a discharge flow rate of the fluid from the pressure container.

12. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising:
an opening/closing valve provided in a middle of the discharge line; and
a leakage detector configured to measure the concentration of the drying liquid by the concentration measurement part provided on a downstream side of the opening/closing valve in a state in which the opening/closing valve closes a flow path of the discharge line, and configured to detect leakage of the opening/closing valve from the measured concentration of the drying liquid.

13. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising:
a concentration measurement line branching from the discharge line on the downstream side of the depressurizing valve of the discharge line, the concentration measurement part being provided in a middle of the concentration measurement line; and
a heater configured to heat the concentration measurement line.

14. A substrate processing apparatus for drying a substrate by substituting a liquid film of a drying liquid formed on the substrate with a supercritical fluid, the substrate processing apparatus comprising:
a pressure container configured to accommodate the substrate on which the liquid film is formed;
a discharge line configured to discharge a fluid inside the pressure container:
a depressurizing valve provided in a middle of the discharge line;
a concentration measurement part configured to measure a concentration of the drying liquid in the fluid flowing through the discharge line,
a storage configured to store temporal change data of the concentration of the drying liquid measured every unit time by the concentration measurement part; and
a drying abnormality detector configured to detect abnormality of drying the substrate based on the temporal change data stored in the storage,
wherein the concentration measurement part is provided on a downstream side of the depressurizing valve of the discharge line and measures the concentration of the drying liquid in the fluid depressurized by the depressurizing valve.

15. The substrate processing apparatus of claim 14 , further comprising:
an opening/closing valve provided in a middle of the discharg

Assignees

• Tokyo Electron Ltd

Inventors

• Gosho Masataka
• Yamamoto Shu
• Ura Tomohito
• Okamura Satoshi

Classifications

• F26B21/30

  Controlling, e.g. regulating, parameters of gas supply · CPC title

• H10P70/80

  Cleaning only by supercritical fluids · CPC title

• H10P72/0408 Primary

  for drying · CPC title

• G01M3/04

  by detecting the presence of fluid at the leakage point · CPC title

• F26B5/005 Primary

  by dipping them into or mixing them with a chemical liquid, e.g. organic; chemical, e.g. organic, dewatering aids (F26B3/005 takes precedence; using chemical vapours or gases F26B21/40) · CPC title