A method for inspecting a wafer includes: rotating the wafer about an axis of the wafer, emitting from a light source, two pairs of incident coherent light beams, each pair forming, at the intersection between the two beams, a measurement volume, a portion of the main wafer surface passing through each of the measurement volumes during the rotation, collecting a light beam scattered by the wafer surface, capturing the collected light and emitting an electrical signal representing the variation in the collected light intensity, detecting in the signal, a frequency, being the time signature of a defect through a respective measurement volume, for each detected signature, determining a visibility parameter, on the basis of the visibility determined, obtaining an item of information on the size of the defect, and cross-checking the items of information to determine the size of the defect.

Disclosed are methods and apparatus for detecting defects or reviewing defects in a semiconductor sample. The system has a brightfield (BF) module for directing a BF illumination beam onto a sample and detecting an output beam reflected from the sample in response to the BF illumination beam. The system has a modulated optical reflectance (MOR) module for directing a pump and probe beam to the sample and detecting a MOR output beam from the probe spot in response to the pump beam and the probe beam. The system includes a processor for analyzing the BF output beam from a plurality of BF spots to detect defects on a surface or near the surface of the sample and analyzing the MOR output beam from a plurality of probe spots to detect defects that are below the surface of the sample.

A method and apparatus to measure specular reflection intensity, specular reflection angle, near specular scattered radiation, and large angle scattered radiation and determine the location and type of defect present in a first and a second transparent solid that have abutting surfaces. The types of defects include a top surface particle, an interface particle, a bottom surface particle, an interface bubble, a top surface pit, and a stain. The four measurements are conducted at multiple locations along the surface of the transparent solid and the measured information is stored in a memory device. The difference between an event peak and a local average of measurements for each type of measurement is used to detect changes in the measurements. Information stored in the memory device is processed to generate a work piece defect mapping indicating the type of defect and the defect location of each defect found.

A method of evaluating quality of a wafer or an apparatus of evaluating quality of a wafer may include: performing a copper-haze evaluation on a piece of wafer or a single crystal ingot; collecting copper-haze map data and a copper-haze evaluation score based on a result of the copper-haze evaluation; training an artificial intelligence model based on the copper-haze map data and the copper-haze evaluation score; and performing crystal defect evaluation on the piece of the wafer or the single crystal ingot using the learned artificial intelligence model that outputs the copper-haze evaluation score when the copper-haze map data is input.

An image view angle conversion method includes: model training data are obtained, the model training data including planar images of a training object at a plurality of different view angles and labels corresponding to respective view angles, where the labels corresponding to the different view angles are different. A pre-designed generative adversarial network model is trained according to the model training data to obtain a view angle conversion network model. A planar image of a target object and labels corresponding to one or more expected view angles of the target object are input into the view angle conversion network model, so that the view angle conversion network model generates planar images of the target object at the expected view angles.

An illumination unit comprising a first electromagnetic wave source including circuitry for outputting a first electromagnetic wave in a first direction to illuminate a first region of a sample; a second electromagnetic wave source including circuitry for outputting a second electromagnetic wave in a second direction substantially opposite to the first direction; and a reflector configured to reflect the second electromagnetic wave substantially in the first direction to illuminate a second region of the sample.

An inspection apparatus is an inspection apparatus for inspecting a sample on which a plurality of light-emitting elements is formed, and includes an excitation light source that generates excitation light to irradiate the sample, a camera that images fluorescence having a wavelength longer than a reference wavelength in fluorescence from the light-emitting elements, and a control apparatus that determines a quality of each of the light-emitting elements based on fluorescence imaged by the camera, in which the reference wavelength is a wavelength obtained by adding a full width at half maximum of a normal fluorescence spectrum of the light-emitting element to a peak wavelength of the normal fluorescence spectrum.

The present disclosure provides an electronic system with defect identification function and a method of qualifying a photoresist pattern formed using a lithography process. The electronic system includes an inspection apparatus and a processor associated with the inspection apparatus. The inspection apparatus is used for acquiring at least one image of the specimen on which a photoresist pattern is formed using a lithography process. The processor is configured to automatically apply machine learning processes implemented through one or more neural networks to identify at least one defect present in the photoresist pattern.

A system for automated focus tracking of a sample is disclosed. The system comprises an illumination source, a set of illumination optics in an illumination path, a set of collection optics in a collection path, a first slit device in the illumination path, a second slit device in the collection path, at least one detector configured to generate an image of the sample, and a controller configured to receive through-focus information from the image, and provide corrective motion to a stage holding the sample to maintain a position of the sample at a selected focus. A method for automated focus tracking of a sample is also disclosed.

An inspection device capable of inspecting a foreign matter even during rotation acceleration/deceleration of an object under inspection. The inspection device includes a rotation-and-translation unit configured to rotate and translate the object under inspection; a light intensity modulation unit configured to modulate intensity of laser light to irradiate the object under inspection; a light intensity control unit configured to control the light intensity modulation unit; an object-under-inspection-operation detection unit configured to calculate information about a linear speed at a laser irradiation position on the object under inspection; a data processing unit configured to start foreign matter and defect inspection when a rotation speed of the object under inspection reaches a predetermined speed and a rotation-and-translation control unit configured to determine a time required for a next single rotation of a rotation stage, and apply, to a translation stage, a translation control value for moving the translation stage.