An imprint apparatus for forming a pattern of an imprint material on a substrate using a mold having a mesa including a pattern region where a pattern and a mark are formed. The apparatus includes an alignment optical system which includes an illumination system configured to illuminate the mark with illumination light and a detecting system configured to detect an image of the mark illuminated by the illumination system. The illumination system includes a limiter configured to limit incidence of the illumination light to a side of the mesa, a ridge line of the mesa, and an outer region of the side.

An imprint apparatus using a mold having a pattern region includes an irradiation unit that irradiates a substrate with irradiation light. The irradiation light has an intensity distribution over a region along a periphery of a shot area of the substrate and being capable of increasing viscosity of an imprint material or of solidifying the imprint material. The imprint apparatus also includes a control unit that sets an imprint condition for forming a pattern of the imprint material so as to reduce at least one of an extrusion of the imprint material from the shot area and an unfilling of the imprint material occurring in the shot area on the basis of results of detecting at least one of the extrusion and the unfilling of the imprint material obtained by detecting the pattern of the imprint material formed on the substrate.

Disclosed is a metrology sensor apparatus and associated method. The metrology sensor apparatus comprises an illumination system operable to illuminate a metrology mark on a substrate with illumination radiation having a first polarization state and an optical collection system configured to collect scattered radiation, following scattering of the illumination radiation by the metrology mark. The metrology mark comprises a main structure and changes, relative to the first polarization state, at least one of a polarization state of a first portion of the scattered radiation predominately resultant from scattering by the main structure and a polarization state of a second portion of radiation predominately resultant from scattering by one or more features other than the main structure, such that the polarization state of the first portion of the scattered radiation is different to the polarization state of the second portion of the scattered radiation. The metrology sensor apparatus further comprises an optical filtering system which filters out the second portion of the scattered radiation based on its polarization state.

As increasing numbers of layers, using increasing numbers of specific materials, are deposited on substrates, it becomes increasingly difficult to detect alignment marks accurately for, for example, applying a desired pattern onto a substrate using a lithographic apparatus, in part due to one or more of the materials used in one or more of the layers being wholly or partially opaque to the radiation used to detect alignment marks. In a first step, the substrate is illuminated with excitation radiation. In a second step, at least one effect associated with a reflected material effect scattered by a buried structure is measured. The effect may, for example, include a physical displacement of the surface of the substrate. In a third step, at least one characteristic of the structure based on the measured effect is derived.

A microelectronic device is formed by loading a wafer, in which the microelectronic device is being formed, onto a pre-alignment stage for a wafer stepper. If the pre-alignment stage does not align the wafer properly using a notch pin, the wafer is loaded onto a wafer stepper stage of the wafer stepper. The wafer is positioned under a Field Image Alignment (FIA) camera of the wafer stepper, so that the FIA camera provides an image of the wafer notch. The wafer is rotated into a proper position. The wafer is transferred back to the pre-alignment stage. The wafer is aligned using the notch pin. The wafer is transferred to the wafer stepper stage. Fabrication is continued to form the microelectronic device.

Disclosed is a lithography process on a sample with at least one emitter, the process including: putting at least one layer of resist above the sample; exciting one selected emitter with light through the at least one layer of resist; detecting light emitted by the excited selected emitter and determining a position of the selected emitter; and curing with a light beam a part of the at least one layer of resist above the position of the selected emitter, the light beam being a shaped light beam having a cross-section, this cross-section having a central part, an intermediate part surrounding the central part and a border part surrounding the intermediate part, the intensity of the shaped light beam on the at least one layer of resist reaching a maximum at the intermediate part.

A measurement system to be used in a manufacturing line for micro-devices is provided independently from an exposure apparatus. The measurement system has measurement devices that each performs measurement processing on substrates (e.g., substrates that have gone through at least one processing but before being coated with a sensitive agent), and a carrying system for performing delivery of substrates to/from the measurement devices. The measurement devices include a first measurement device that acquires position information on a plurality of marks formed on a substrate under a setting of a first condition, and a second measurement device that acquires position information on a plurality of marks formed on another substrate (e.g., another substrate included in the same lot as the substrate on which acquiring position information is performed under the setting of the first condition in the first measurement device) under a setting of a first condition.

A semiconductor device includes a substrate including a plurality of chip areas and a scribe line defined thereon, and a mark pattern disposed in the scribe line. The mark pattern includes a plurality of unit cells immediately adjacent to each other, and each unit cell includes a first active region, a second active region isolated from the first active region, a plurality of first gate structures extending along a first direction and arranged along a second direction perpendicular to the first direction, and a plurality of first conductive structures. The first gate structures straddle the first active region and the second active region. The first conductive structures are disposed on the first active region, the second active region, and two opposite sides of the first gate structures.

Aspects of the present disclosure include methods, apparatuses, and computer readable media for emitting an incident light toward a semiconductor layer of a semiconductor device, wherein the incident light is a sub-bandgap light substantially transparent to the semiconductor layer, detecting a reflected light generated from the incident light penetrating through the semiconductor layer of the semiconductor device and reflecting off of a portion of the semiconductor device, identifying a macroscopic feature underneath the semiconductor layer based on the reflected light, wherein the macroscopic feature corresponds to the portion of the semiconductor device and is visible to the naked eye, and performing an alignment procedure by using the identified macroscopic feature as a reference for the alignment procedure.

An imprint apparatus for forming a pattern of an imprint material on a substrate using a mold includes a plurality of alignment scopes and a control unit. The control unit controls aligning of a shot region of the substrate and the mold based on outputs from the plurality of alignment scopes. Each of the plurality of alignment scopes outputs information indicating a relative position of a first mark selected from a plurality of first marks in the shot region and a second mark selected from a plurality of second marks on the mold. The control unit controls aligning of the shot region and the mold based on information excluding incorrect information from a plurality of pieces of information output from the plurality of alignment scopes.