Patent ID: 7103505

Claim:
A method of characterizing defects in wafers during fabrication in a semiconductor fabrication facility, comprising: (a) inspecting semiconductor wafers to locate defects; (b) storing locations corresponding to the located defects in a defect file; (c) automatically navigating a dual charged-particle beam system to the vicinity defect location using information from the defect file; (d) automatically identifying the defect and obtaining a charged particle beam image of the defect; (e) analyzing the charged particle beam image to characterize the defect; (f) determining a recipe for further analysis of the defect; (g) automatically executing the recipe to cut a portion of the defect using a charged particle beam, the position of the cut being based upon the analysis of the charged particle beam image; and (h) imaging a surface exposed by the charged particle beam cut to obtain additional information about the defect.