Fitting of optical model to measured spectrum

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-8944884-B2
Application number	US-201313773063-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Feb 21, 2013
Priority date	Mar 8, 2012
Publication date	Feb 3, 2015
Grant date	Feb 3, 2015

Abstract

A method of controlling a polishing operation includes polishing a first layer of a substrate, during polishing, obtaining a sequence over time of measured spectra with an in-situ optical monitoring system, for each measured spectrum from the sequence of measured spectra, fitting an optical model to the measured spectrum, the fitting including finding parameters that provide a minimum difference between an output spectrum of the optical model and the measured spectrum, the parameters including an endpoint parameter and at least one non-endpoint parameter, the fitting generating a sequence of fitted endpoint parameter values, each endpoint parameter value of the sequence associated with one of the spectra of the sequence of measured spectra, and determining at least one of a polishing endpoint or an adjustment of a pressure to the substrate from the sequence of fitted endpoint parameter values.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of controlling a polishing operation, comprising:
polishing a first layer of a substrate in a chemical mechanical polishing system;
obtaining a measured spectrum with an optical monitoring system positioned in the chemical mechanical polishing system;
fitting an optical model to the measured spectrum, the fitting including finding parameter values of parameters that provide a minimum of a difference between an output spectrum of the optical model and the measured spectrum, the parameters including an endpoint parameter and at least one non-endpoint parameter, the fitting generating a fitted endpoint parameter value and a fitted non-endpoint parameter value; and
determining at least one of a polishing endpoint or an adjustment of a pressure for the chemical mechanical polishing system from the fitted endpoint parameter value.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the endpoint parameter comprises a thickness of the first layer.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the non-endpoint parameter comprises at least one of an index of refraction or an extinction coefficient of the first layer or a thickness, an index of refraction, or an extinction coefficient of a second layer underlying the first layer.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the non-endpoint parameter comprises the index of refraction and the extinction coefficient of the first layer.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein the non-endpoint parameter comprises a plurality of thicknesses, each thickness of the plurality of thicknesses associated with a different layer in a stack of layers below the first layer.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein finding the parameter values comprises performing a regression technique to minima of the difference between the measured spectrum and the output spectrum generated by the optical model.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the regression technique comprises Levenberg-Marquardt, Fminunc( ), lsqnonlin( ) or simulated annealing.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein fitting the optical model to the measured spectrum comprises finding a plurality of local minima and identifying a global minima from the plurality of local minima.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein finding the plurality of local minima comprises genetic algorithms, running the regression techniques from multiple starting points with parallel computing, global search, or pattern searching.

10. A method of controlling a polishing operation, comprising:
polishing a first layer of a substrate;
during polishing, obtaining a sequence over time of measured spectra with an in-situ optical monitoring system;
for each measured spectrum from the sequence of measured spectra, fitting an optical model to the measured spectrum, the fitting including finding parameter values of parameters that provide a minimum of a difference between an output spectrum of the optical model and the measured spectrum, the parameters including an endpoint parameter and at least one non-endpoint parameter, the fitting generating a sequence of fitted endpoint parameter values, each endpoint parameter value of the sequence of fitted endpoint parameter values associated with one of the spectra of the sequence of measured spectra; and
determining at least one of a polishing endpoint or an adjustment of a pressure to the substrate from the sequence of fitted endpoint parameter values.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein the endpoint parameter comprises a thickness of the first layer.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the non-endpoint parameter comprises at least one of an index of refraction or an extinction coefficient of the first layer or a thickness, an index of refraction, or an extinction coefficient of a second layer underlying the first layer.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the non-endpoint parameter comprises the index of refraction and the extinction coefficient of the first layer.

14. The method of claim 12 , wherein the non-endpoint parameter comprises a plurality of thicknesses, each thickness of the plurality of thicknesses associated with a different layer in a stack of layers below the first layer.

15. The method of claim 10 , wherein the difference comprises a sum of squares difference between the output spectrum and the measured spectrum or a sum of absolute differences between the output spectrum and the measured spectrum.

16. The method of claim 10 , wherein finding the parameter values comprises performing a regression technique to minima of the difference between the measured spectrum and the output spectrum generated by the optical model.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the regression technique comprises Levenberg-Marquardt, Fminunc( ), lsqnonlin( ) or simulated annealing.

18. The method of claim 10 , wherein fitting the optical model to the measured spectrum comprises finding a plurality of local minima and identifying a global minima from the plurality of local minima.

19. The method of claim 18 , wherein finding the plurality of local minima comprises genetic algorithms, running the regression techniques from multiple starting points with parallel computing, global search, or pattern searching.

20. The method of claim 10 , comprising fitting a linear function to the sequence of fitted endpoint parameter values, and wherein determining the polishing endpoint comprises determining where the linear function equals a target value.

Assignees

• David Jeffrey Drue
• Benvegnu Dominic J
• Applied Materials Inc

Inventors

• David Jeffrey Drue
• Benvegnu Dominic J

Classifications

• B24B37/013 Primary

  Devices or means for detecting lapping completion · CPC title

• B24B49/12

  involving optical means · CPC title