Provided is a pattern inspection method including: irradiating a substrate with an electron beam, a pattern being formed on the substrate; acquiring an inspection image as a secondary electron image of the pattern; setting a pixel value equal to or less than a first threshold value minus a half of a predetermined detection width of the inspection image and a pixel value equal to or more than the first threshold value plus a half of the predetermined detection width of the inspection image to unprocessed; acquiring a difference image between the inspection image having the pixel value having less than the first threshold value minus the half of the predetermined detection width and the pixel value having more of the first threshold value plus the half of the predetermined detection width being set to unprocessed and a reference image of the inspection image; and performing inspection on the basis of the difference image.

The invention concerns a method of optical, inspection of an electronic circuit (Card) including the acquisition of images of the electronic circuit by image sensors (C), the use of the images to determine the offset between the position of the electronic circuit (Card) and an inspection position, and the use of said images in at least another step of the method.

Embodiments of the disclosure provide methods and system for inspecting and treating a substrate. In one embodiment, a method is provided including transmitting a first plurality of beams from a diffractive beam splitter to a first surface of a substrate to generate a reflection of a second plurality of beams, wherein the first plurality of beams are spaced apart from each other upon arriving at the first surface of the substrate; receiving the second plurality of beams on a recording surface of an optical device, wherein the second plurality of beams are spaced apart from each other upon arriving at the recording surface; measuring positional information of the second plurality of beams on the recording surface; comparing the positional information of the second plurality of beams to positional information stored in a memory; and storing a result of the comparison in the memory.

The present disclosure describes a method for controlling a wet processing system includes dispensing one or more chemicals into a processing chamber according to one or more process parameters. The method also includes injecting one or more illumination markers into the processing chamber and obtaining images representing locations of the one or more illumination markers. The method further includes determining a trajectory of an illumination marker of the one or more illumination markers based on the images and determining whether the determined trajectory is outside a predetermined trajectory range. In response to the determined trajectory being outside the predetermined trajectory range, the method further includes adjusting the one or more process parameters.

This disclosure relates to methods for determining the quality of polymers, more particularly, polyolefins. The methods involve Raman spectroscopy and artificial intelligence to compute polymer properties and/or features.

A seam inspection device includes an imaging device and a processing device. The imaging device shoots a sewing object supported by a throat plate of a sewing machine and having seams formed therein. And the processing device detects an abnormality of the seam based on an image of the sewing object acquired by the imaging device.

Systems and methods are provided for determining defects in a semiconductor structure sample that is prepared for analysis by microscopy. A semiconductor structure sample preparation and analysis system includes a semiconductor structure sample that includes a structure, a protective capping layer on the structure, and a gap filler material on the protective capping layer. A microscopy apparatus acquires an image of the semiconductor structure sample. Sample defect recognition circuitry determines the presence of a defect in the semiconductor structure sample based on the acquired image.

Disclosed are apparatus and methods for inspecting a sample. Locations corresponding to candidate defect events on a sample are provided from an inspector operable to acquire optical images from which such candidate defect events are detected at their corresponding locations across the sample. High-resolution images are acquired from a high-resolution inspector of the candidate defect events at their corresponding locations on the sample. Each of a set of modelled optical images, which have been modeled from a set of the acquired high-resolution images, is correlated with corresponding ones of a set of the acquired optical images, to identify surface noise events, as shown in the set of high-resolution images, as sources for the corresponding candidate events in the set of acquired optical images. Otherwise, a subsurface event is identified as a likely source for a corresponding candidate defect event.

The inspecting method is for a product including a transparent substrate and a part placed at a predetermined position within a front surface of the transparent substrate, and includes an imaging step and an evaluating step. The imaging step is a step of taking an image of the front surface by an imaging device with the front surface being illuminated by an illuminating device. The evaluating step is a step of evaluating a degree of matching between an image which is derived from the image (P10) taken by the imaging device and shows a position corresponding to the predetermined position and its vicinity, and a template. The template is indicative of a positional relationship between a real image and a virtual image, of the part in a case where the part is placed at the predetermined position correctly.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a pattern structure inspection method including irradiating a wave from a wave source onto a sample including a pattern region in which a structure having a certain pattern is provided on a substrate, collecting speckle data generated due to multiple scattering of the wave in the pattern region, by using a data collector, and analyzing whether the structure of the pattern region has a defect, by comparing the collected speckle data to reference speckle data.