Methods for removing an oxide film from a silicon-on-insulator structure are disclosed. The oxide may be stripped from a SOI structure before deposition of an epitaxial silicon thickening layer. The oxide film may be removed by dispensing an etching solution toward a center region of the SOI structure and dispensing an etching solution to an edge region of the structure.

In the present invention, a substrate processing liquid includes an auxiliary agent which is added to a solution in which a sublimable substance is dissolved in a solvent, to thereby disperse particles of the sublimable substance, the amount of which exceeds the solubility, in the solution. In the substrate processing liquid, the particles of the sublimable substance, the amount of which exceeds the solubility, are uniformly dispersed and dissolved in the solvent. Therefore, the amount of sublimable substance to be supplied onto a pattern formation surface of a substrate is larger than that in the conventional technique and a large amount of sublimable substance (solid phase) exists inside a pattern. As a result, it is possible to effectively suppress the solvent from remaining between the patterns and perform sublimation drying in a state where the patterns are firmly held by the sublimable substance (solid phase).

In an embodiment, a method includes: receiving a wafer from a first dilution tank; immersing the wafer in a deionization tank, wherein the deionization tank comprises a tank solution that comprises a deionizing solution; determining a metal ion concentration within the tank solution; performing remediation within the deionization tank in response to determining that the metal ion concentration is greater than a threshold value; and moving the wafer to a second dilution tank.

A substrate processing method according to an embodiment of the present disclosure includes a step of holding a substrate by a substrate holding unit (31) which is rotatable, a step of arranging a top plate portion (41) above the substrate, a step of supplying a processing liquid to the substrate, and a step of supplying a rinsing liquid (Lr) between the substrate and the top plate portion (41) to wash the substrate and the top plate portion (41) with the rinsing liquid (Lr).

The present invention is a method for forming a thermal oxide film on a semiconductor substrate, including: a correlation acquisition step of providing a plurality of semiconductor substrates each having a chemical oxide film having a different constitution formed by cleaning, performing a thermal oxidization treatment under identical thermal oxidization treatment conditions to form a thermal oxide film, and determining a correlation between the constitution of the chemical oxide film and a thickness of the thermal oxide film in advance; a cleaning condition determination step of determining the constitution of the chemical oxide film based on the correlation obtained in the correlation acquisition step so that a thickness of a thermal oxide film to be formed on a semiconductor substrate is a predetermined thickness, and determining cleaning conditions for forming a chemical oxide film having the determined constitution of the chemical oxide film; a substrate cleaning step of cleaning the semiconductor substrate under the determined cleaning conditions; and a thermal oxide film formation step of performing a thermal oxidization treatment on the cleaned semiconductor substrate under conditions identical to the thermal oxidization treatment conditions in the correlation acquisition step to form a thermal oxide film on a surface of the semiconductor substrate. Consequently, a thermal oxide film is formed with the target film thickness with excellent reproducibility.

A method for fabricating semiconductor device includes the steps of: forming fin-shaped structures on a substrate; using isopropyl alcohol (IPA) to perform a rinse process; performing a baking process; and forming a gate oxide layer on the fin-shaped structures. Preferably, a duration of the rinse process is between 15 seconds to 60 seconds, a temperature of the baking process is between 50° C. to 100° C., and a duration of the baking process is between 5 seconds to 120 seconds.

A system for controlling damages in cleaning a semiconductor wafer comprising features of patterned structures, the system comprising: a wafer holder for temporary restraining a semiconductor wafer during a cleaning process; an inlet for delivering a cleaning liquid over a surface of the semiconductor wafer; a sonic generator configured to alternately operate at a first frequency and a first power level for a first predetermined period of time and at a second frequency and a second power level for a second predetermined period of time, to impart sonic energy to the cleaning liquid, the first predetermined period of time and the second predetermined period of time consecutively following one another; and a controller programmed to provide the cleaning parameters, wherein at least one of the cleaning parameters is determined such that a percentage of damaged features as a result of the imparting sonic energy is lower than a predetermined threshold.

A substrate processing method includes a substrate holding step of holding a substrate having a front surface on which a metal is exposed, an inert gas replacing step of replacing an atmosphere around the front surface of the substrate with an inert gas by supplying an inert gas to a vicinity of the front surface of the substrate, an adjusting step of adjusting a pH of the rinsing liquid so as to form an inactive state in which the metal does not react with the rinsing liquid or so as to form a passive state by allowing the metal to react with the rinsing liquid, and a rinsing liquid supplying step of supplying the rinsing liquid whose pH has been adjusted to the front surface of the substrate after the atmosphere around the front surface of the substrate has been replaced with the inert gas.

Methods for removing an oxide film and for cleaning silicon-on-insulator structures are disclosed. The methods may involve immersing the silicon-on-insulator structure in a stripping bath to strip an oxide film from the surface of the silicon-on-insulator structure. The stripped silicon-on-insulator structure is immersed in an ozone bath comprising ozone. The ozone-treated silicon-on-insulator structure may be immersed in an SC-1 bath comprising ammonium hydroxide and hydrogen peroxide to clean the structure.

Embodiments of wet processing systems and methods for uniform wet processing are disclosed. A method described in the present disclosure includes measuring one or more wafer characteristics of a wafer using a plurality of detectors and determining a wafer profile of the wafer based on the measured one or more wafer characteristics. The method also includes setting first and second sets of wet processing parameters of a wet processing system for respective first and second wafer regions based on the wafer profile, where a value of at least one wet processing parameter is different between the first and second sets of wet processing parameters. The method further includes performing wet processing on the wafer by dispensing one or more chemicals onto the first and second wafer regions according to the respective first and second sets of wet processing parameters.