An improved leveling sensor and method for adjusting a sample height in a charged-particle beam inspection system are disclosed. An improved leveling sensor comprises a light source configured to project a first pattern onto a sample and a detector configured to capture an image of a projected pattern after the first pattern is projected on the sample. The first pattern can comprise an irregularity to enable a determination of a vertical displacement of the sample.

A method for analyzing at least one bounded object in an electron microscope image that includes segmenting the image to provide a segmented image and measuring a dimension relative to the at least one bounded object in the segmented image. The electron microscope image can be an image of a semiconductor device that includes a pattern of bounded objects or structure of the semiconductor device.

A charged particle beam scanning module, a charged particle beam device, and a computer that can correct an INL error in a DAC circuit in real time. The charged particle beam scanning module includes a scanning controller configured to output a scanning digital signal of a charged particle beam, a DAC circuit configured to convert the scanning digital signal into a scanning analog signal and output the scanning analog signal, and an ADC circuit configured to convert the scanning analog signal into an evaluation digital signal. A sampling frequency at which the DAC circuit samples the scanning digital signal is a first frequency, and a sampling frequency at which the ADC circuit samples the scanning analog signal is a second frequency smaller than the first frequency. The scanning controller determines an output characteristic of the DAC circuit by evaluating the scanning digital signal and the evaluation digital signal.

A method, an apparatus, and a program for more appropriately determining a condition for appropriately recognizing a semiconductor pattern are provided. A method for determining a condition related to a captured image of a charged particle beam apparatus including: acquiring, by a processor, a plurality of captured images, each of the captured images being an image generated by irradiating a pattern formed on a wafer with a charged particle beam, and detecting electrons emitted from the pattern, each of the captured images being an image captured according to one or more imaging conditions, the method further including: acquiring teaching information for each of the captured images; acquiring, by the processor, one or more feature determination conditions; calculating, by the processor, a feature for each of the captured images based on each of the feature determination conditions, at least one of the imaging condition and the feature determination condition being plural.

A multi-beam charged particle microscope and a method of operating a multi-beam charged particle microscope for wafer inspection with high throughput and with high resolution and high reliability are provided. The method of operation and the multi-beam charged particle beam microscope comprises a mechanism for a synchronized scanning operation and image acquisition by a plurality of charged particle beamlets according a selected scan program, wherein the selected scan program can be selected according an inspection task from different scan programs.

Provided is a method for adjusting a field-of-view of a charged particle microscope device, in which reference data for a sample is set, a plurality of regions of interest are set for the reference data, a rough sampling coordinate group is set for each of the plurality of regions of interest, the sample is irradiated with charged particles based on the sampling coordinate group to obtain a corresponding pixel value group, a plurality of reconstructed images corresponding to the plurality of regions of interest are generated based on the pixel value group, a correspondence relationship among the plurality of regions of interest is estimated based on the plurality of reconstructed images, and the plurality of regions of interest are adjusted based on the correspondence relationship. Here, the sampling coordinate group is set based on the reference data.

A pattern inspection apparatus includes a secondary electron image acquisition mechanism to include a deflector deflecting multiple primary electron beams and a detector detecting multiple secondary electron beams, and acquire a secondary electron image corresponding to each of the multiple primary electron beams by scanning a target object with a pattern thereon with the multiple primary electron beams by the deflector, and detecting the multiple secondary electron beams from the target object by the detector, a storage device to store individual correction kernels each generated for individually adjusting a secondary electron image corresponding to each primary electron beam concerning a reference pattern to be commensurate with a reference blurred image, and a correction circuit to correct, by correspondingly using the individual correction kernel, the secondary electron image corresponding to each primary electron beam acquired from the inspection target object.

A charged particle beam device 100 includes: an irradiation unit 110 configured to irradiate a sample S with a charged particle beam; a particle detection unit 130 configured to detect a particle caused by the irradiation of the sample with the charged particle beam; and a control unit 151 configured to generate an image of the sample based on an output from the particle detection unit, wherein the control unit 151 inputs the image of the sample S into models M1 and M2 for detecting a first structure 401 and a second structure 402, acquires a first detection result related to the first structure 401 and a second detection result related to the second structure 402 from the models M1 and M2, determines locations or regions of the first structure 401 and the second structure 402 based on the first detection result and the second detection result, and outputs an integration result image 203 representing the location or the region of the first structure 401 and the location or the region of the second structure 402.

A method of automatically focusing a charged particle beam on a surface region of a sample is provided. The method includes acquiring a plurality of images for a corresponding plurality of focusing strength values; calculating a plurality of sharpness values based on the plurality of images, the plurality of sharpness values are calculated with a sharpness function provided as a sum in a frequency space based on the plurality of images; and determining subsequent focusing strength values of the plurality of focusing strength values with a golden ratio search algorithm based one the calculated sharpness values.

An object of the invention is to provide a charged particle beam device capable of specifying an irradiation position of light on a sample when there is no mechanism for forming an image of backscattered electrons. The charged particle beam device according to the invention determines whether an irradiation position of a primary charged particle beam and an irradiation position of light match based on a difference between a first observation image acquired when the sample is irradiated with only the primary charged particle beam and a second observation image acquired when sample is irradiated with the light in addition to the primary charged particle beam. It is determined whether the irradiation position of the primary charged particle beam and the irradiation position of the light match using the first observation image and a measurement result by a light amount measuring device.