APPARATUS FOR THERMAL PROCESSING STRUCTURES FORMED ON A SUBSTRATE
First Claim
1. An apparatus for thermally processing a semiconductor substrate, comprising:
- a substrate support having a substrate supporting surface;
a heating element that is adapted to heat a substrate disposed on the substrate support; and
an intense light source that is adapted to deliver an amount of radiation to a region on a surface of the substrate disposed on the substrate supporting surface.
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Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention generally describes one ore more apparatuses and various methods that are used to perform an annealing process on desired regions of a substrate. In one embodiment, an amount of energy is delivered to the surface of the substrate to preferentially melt certain desired regions of the substrate to remove unwanted damage created from prior processing steps (e.g., crystal damage from implant processes), more evenly distribute dopants in various regions of the substrate, and/or activate various regions of the substrate. The preferential melting processes will allow more uniform distribution of the dopants in the melted region, due to the increased diffusion rate and solubility of the dopant atoms in the molten region of the substrate. The creation of a melted region thus allows: 1) the dopant atoms to redistribute more uniformly, 2) defects created in prior processing steps to be removed, and 3) regions that have hyper-abrupt dopant concentrations to be formed.
115 Citations
23 Claims
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1. An apparatus for thermally processing a semiconductor substrate, comprising:
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a substrate support having a substrate supporting surface; a heating element that is adapted to heat a substrate disposed on the substrate support; and an intense light source that is adapted to deliver an amount of radiation to a region on a surface of the substrate disposed on the substrate supporting surface. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. An apparatus for thermally processing a semiconductor substrate, comprising:
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an first intense light source that is adapted to deliver a first amount of energy to a region on a surface of the substrate disposed on the substrate supporting surface; and a second intense light source that is adapted to deliver a second amount of energy to the region on the surface of the substrate disposed on the substrate supporting surface; and a controller that is adapted to monitor the first amount of energy delivered to the region on the surface of the substrate and control the time between the delivery of the first amount and second amount of energy and the magnitude of the second amount of energy to achieve a desired temperature in the region. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. An apparatus for thermally processing a semiconductor substrate, comprising:
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a substrate support having a substrate supporting surface and an aperture formed in the substrate support; and an intense light source that is adapted to deliver an amount of radiation to a first area of the substrate through the aperture formed in the substrate support and a rear surface of the substrate which is opposite to a front surface of the substrate, wherein the front surface of the substrate contains one or more semiconductor devices formed thereon and the amount of radiation is adapted to melt a region contained within the first area. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16)
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17. An apparatus for thermally processing a semiconductor substrate, comprising:
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a substrate support having a substrate supporting surface and an aperture formed in the substrate support; a first source that is adapted to deliver an amount of electromagnetic radiation to a first area of the substrate through the aperture formed in the substrate support and a rear surface of the substrate which is opposite to a front surface of the substrate, wherein the front surface of the substrate contains one or more semiconductor devices formed thereon and the amount of radiation is adapted to melt a region contained within the first area; and a second source that is adapted to deliver an amount of electromagnetic radiation to a first area of the substrate at a desired wavelength. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23)
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Specification