Patent ID: 7328126
Filing Date: 2008-02-05
Classification: G05B,H01L

Abstract:
1. A method of monitoring a processing system for processing a substrate during the course of semiconductor manufacturing, comprising: acquiring initial data from said processing system for a plurality of observations from a first set of substrate runs having performed a process in the processing system, said initial data comprising a plurality of data parameters; constructing a principal components analysis (PCA) model from said data parameters of the first set, said PCA model including centering coefficients for the initial data from the first set; acquiring additional data from said processing system after said constructing step from a second set of substrate runs performing said process in the processing system, said additional data comprising an additional observation of said plurality of data parameters; adjusting said centering coefficients at the time of each observation of the additional data from the second set by utilizing both said initial data and current data obtained from the additional observation from the process performed in the second set to produce updated adaptive centering coefficients for each of said data parameters in said PCA model; applying said updated adaptive centering coefficients to each of said data parameters in said PCA model created from the first set of substrate runs and unchanged; determining at least one statistical quantity using a combination of said PCA model and the additional data that has been centered by the updated adaptive centering coefficients; setting a control limit for said at least one statistical quantity; comparing said at least one statistical quantity to said control limit in order to determine if the substrate processing remains within control during the course of semiconductor manufacturing for the second set; and providing an output assessing the process being performed in the processing system.