AST RTA Production Process Overview

Objective:
Given a list of operating sequence steps for the RTA, the Operator will
correctly number each of the steps in sequence.

Introduction:
The AST 2800 Rapid Thermal Anneal (RTA) is a fast-heating rapid thermal
annealing system used by the Implant module to do the following:
Repair damage to wafer surface caused by ion implant and other wafer fabrication processes
Activate electrons implanted in the wafer during ion implant
Form titanium silicide (TiSi) wafers.
Operating Sequence of the RTA Process

The annealing process performed with the RTA takes about three to four
minutes per wafer and includes the following steps. Figure 1-1 provides
a visual representation of these steps.
1. The Operator loads the cassette with wafers into the primary sender
station, and loads an empty cassette into the primary receiver station.
2. The Operator activates the recipe using the pull-down keyboard.
3. The RTA’s robot arm picks up a single wafer from the sender cassette
and positions it on the wafer aligner.
4. The wafer is automatically aligned and moved into the quartz chamber.
5. The wafer is evenly heated at a temperature of 600C to 1050C by an
array of 38 lamps positioned above, below, and to the side of the
wafer. The exact temperature and length of heating depends on which
anneal process has been set in the recipe which is controlled by Thin
Films engineers.
6. The RTA process is approximately 90 seconds of process time depending
on the recipe used.
7. At the completion of the process the robot arm picks up the wafer
from the quartz chamber, and puts the wafer into the cooling station
located above the quartz chamber. The wafer is cooled back to room
temperature.
8. The robot arm takes the wafer out of the cooling station and puts it
into the receiving cassette.
9. After lot completion use the PROC command to proceed.
10. The Operator must use Workstream commands to move the lot to the
next operation. Workstream automatically stores the data from the
current step and moves the lot into the next operation.
11. After all wafers in the sender cassette have been processed, the
Operator carefully removes the loaded receiver cassette from the RTA,
places the cassette in a cart, and moves the cart to the stocker.
Other details regarding safety, qualifying the machine, verifying
equipment status, running lots, maintenance, and troubleshooting will be
found in this manual.

Click for Sample 1: A Production Process
Click for Sample 2: Production Safety Hazards
Click for Sample 3: Alarm Reset Instructions
Click for Sample 4: Software Instructions (long)
Click for Sample 5: Machine/Software Instructions (long)

Click to go back to Resume.