Methods and systems for controlling a semiconductor fabrication process

Abstract

Software for controlling processes in a heterogeneous semiconductor manufacturing environment may include a wafer-centric database, a real-time scheduler using a neural network, and a graphical user interface displaying simulated operation of the system. These features may be employed alone or in combination to offer improved usability and computational efficiency for real time control and monitoring of a semiconductor manufacturing process. More generally, these techniques may be usefully employed in a variety of real time control systems, particularly systems requiring complex scheduling decisions or heterogeneous systems constructed of hardware from numerous independent vendors.

1 - 75 . (canceled)  
     
     
         76 . A method comprising: 
 creating a data structure for a workpiece, the data structure including an identity of the workpiece and one or more fields for storing information relating to the workpiece;    processing the workpiece in a semiconductor manufacturing system;    receiving data from the semiconductor manufacturing system relating to the processing of the workpiece; and    storing the data in one of the one or more fields of the data structure.    
     
     
         77 . The method of  claim 76 , wherein the data structure is an object oriented data structure.  
     
     
         78 . The method of  claim 76 , wherein the data structure is embodied in a relational database.  
     
     
         79 . The method of  claim 76 , further comprising creating a plurality of data structures for a plurality of workpieces.  
     
     
         80 . The method of  claim 76 , wherein the data includes a measured property of the workpiece.  
     
     
         81 . The method of  claim 80 , wherein the measured property includes one or more of a process time for the workpiece, a temperature of the workpiece, and a location of the workpiece.  
     
     
         82 - 83 . (canceled)  
     
     
         84 . The method of  claim 76 , wherein the data includes a calculated property of the workpiece.  
     
     
         85 . The method of  claim 84 , wherein the calculated property includes an estimated temperature of the workpiece.  
     
     
         86 . The method of  claim 85 , further comprising updating the estimated temperature according to a thermal model for the workpiece.  
     
     
         87 . The method of  claim 85 , further comprising storing a time at which the temperature was estimated.  
     
     
         88 . The method of  claim 76 , wherein the workpiece includes a semiconductor wafer.  
     
     
         89 . The method of  claim 76 , further comprising providing data from a plurality of process modules for storage in the data structure.  
     
     
         90 . The method of  claim 76 , further comprising providing data from a robotic semiconductor wafer handler for storage in the data structure.  
     
     
         91 . (canceled)  
     
     
         92 . The method of  claim 76 , further comprising storing an attribute of the data in one of the one or more fields of the data structure.  
     
     
         93 . The method of  claim 92 , wherein the attribute identifies at least one of a time that the data was acquired and a source of the data.  
     
     
         94 . (canceled)  
     
     
         95 . The method of  claim 76 , further comprising retrieving data from at least one of the one or more fields of the data structure and using the retrieved data to control processing of the workpiece.  
     
     
         96 . The method of  claim 76  wherein the data includes a recipe for processing the workpiece.  
     
     
         97 . The method of  claim 76  wherein the data includes a particle map for the workpiece that identifies a location of one or more particles on the workpiece.  
     
     
         98 . The method of  claim 76  wherein the data includes a process history for the workpiece.  
     
     
         99 . A computer program product comprising computer executable code embodied on a computer readable medium that, when executing on one or more computing devices, performs the steps of: 
 creating a data structure for a workpiece, the data structure including an identity of the workpiece and one or more fields for storing information relating to the workpiece;    receiving data from a semiconductor manufacturing system relating to processing of the workpiece while the workpiece is processed by the semiconductor manufacturing system; and    storing the data in one of the one or more fields of the data structure.    
     
     
         100 - 121 . (canceled)  
     
     
         122 . A system comprising: 
 a semiconductor manufacturing system;    at least one program to control operation of the semiconductor manufacturing system to process a plurality of wafers, and to receive data from the semiconductor manufacturing system relating to one of the plurality of wafers;    a database that maintains a data structure for each one of the plurality of wafers and stores the received data in the data structure corresponding to the related one of the plurality of wafers.    
     
     
         123 . The system of  claim 122 , wherein the at least one program includes software to optimize throughput of the semiconductor manufacturing system according to wafer-specific data in the database.  
     
     
         124 - 132 . (canceled)