Development of Wafer-Type Plasma Monitoring Sensor with Automated Robot Arm Transfer Capability for Two-Dimensional In Situ Processing Plasma Diagnosis

Abstract

In this work, we propose our newly developed wafer-type plasma monitoring sensor based on a floating-type double probe method that can be useful for two-dimensional (2D) in situ plasma diagnosis within a semiconductor processing chamber. A key achievement of this work is the first realization of an ultra-thin plasma monitoring sensor with a system thickness of ~1.4 mm, which supports a fully automated robot arm transfer capability for in situ plasma diagnosis. To the best of our knowledge, it is the thinnest accomplishment among all wafer-type plasma monitoring sensors. Our proposed sensor is assembled with two Si wafers and SiO2-based probes; accordingly, it makes it possible to monitor the actual dynamics of processing plasmas under electrostatic chucking (ESC) conditions. Also, it allows for the prevention of chamber contamination issues after continuously exposing the radio frequency (RF) to various processing gases. Using a test-bed chamber, we successfully demonstrated the feasibility and system performance of the proposed sensor, including robot arm transfer capability, vacuum and thermal stress durability, and data integrity and reproducibility. Consequently, compared with the conventional plasma diagnostic tools, we expect that our proposed sensor will be highly beneficial for tool-to-tool matching (TTTM) and/or for studying various plasma-related items by more accurately providing the parameters of processing plasmas, further saving both time and manpower resources required for preventive maintenance (PM) routines as well.