Patent ID: 8354135
Filing Date: 2013-01-15
Classification: C23C

Abstract:
1. A method for regulating a temperature of a thermal processing apparatus during performance of a film deposition therein, the apparatus including: a process chamber capable of accommodating a plurality of objects to be processed; a heating unit configured to heat an inside of the process chamber; a process-gas supply unit configured to supply a process gas into the process chamber; a preheating unit configured to heat a process gas supplied from the process-gas supply unit, before the process gas is supplied into the process chamber; a process-condition storage unit that stores process conditions in accordance with a process content, the process conditions including a temperature of the process chamber heated by the heating unit, a temperature of the process gas heated by the preheating unit, an in-plane uniformity of the process, and an inter-plane uniformity of the process; and a processing unit configured to process the objects to be processed under the process conditions stored in the process-condition storage unit, the method comprising, simultaneously with the film deposition, performing temperature regulating by: one of the process-gas temperature regulating step and the process-chamber temperature regulating step is performed after the other of the process-gas temperature regulating step and the process-chamber temperature regulating step has been performed so as to avoid overlapping of the process-gas temperature regulating step and the process-chamber temperature regulating step.