PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 16146433
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-09
Publication Date: 2019-02
Patent Classification: ["355", "053000"]

Abstract:
Position information of a movable body within an XY plane is measured with high accuracy by an encoder system whose measurement values have favorable short-term stability, without being affected by air fluctuations, and also position information of the movable body in a Z-axis direction orthogonal to the XY plane is measured with high accuracy by a surface position measuring system, without being affected by air fluctuations. In this case, since both of the encoder system and the surface position measuring system directly measure the upper surface of the movable body, simple and direct position control of the movable body can be performed.

Claim (Index 18):
An exposure method of exposing a substrate with an illumination light via a liquid, the method comprising:\n locally forming a liquid immersion area with the liquid under a lens disposed closest to an image plane side of a projection optical system, by a nozzle member provided to surround the lens and having a lower surface to which the substrate is placed facing, the illumination light passing through the projection optical system, the projection optical system having a plurality of optical elements including the lens and a mirror, and the plurality of optical elements being held in a barrel; holding a mask illuminated with the illumination light, with a first stage disposed above the projection optical system; of a second stage and a third stage that are disposed on a base member below the nozzle member, placing the third stage to face the projection optical system, wherein\n the second stage has a holder to hold the substrate, and holds the substrate in a recessed portion, in which the holder is disposed, of an upper surface of the second stage, and \n the third stage has at least one measurement member that detects the illumination light via the projection optical system and the liquid of the liquid immersion area; \n measuring positional information of the first stage with a first measurement device and positional information of the second stage with a second measurement device, wherein\n the second measurement device irradiates a grating section having a plurality of scale members disposed substantially parallel to a predetermined plane, with a plurality of measurement beams, and measures positional information of the second stage in directions of three degrees of freedom within the predetermined plane including a first direction and a second direction orthogonal to each other within the predetermined plane, and in a third direction orthogonal to the predetermined plane, the plurality of scale members each having a reflective grating that is periodic in a direction parallel to the predetermined plane, and the predetermined plane being orthogonal to an optical axis of the projection optical system; \n detecting positional information in the third direction of the substrate held by the second stage, with a detection device that is disposed on one side in the first direction with respect to the projection optical system, spaced apart from the projection optical system; moving the second stage from the one side in the first direction with respect to the third stage so that the second stage comes close to the third stage placed facing the projection optical system; moving the second and the third stages that have come close together from the one side to the other side in the first direction so that the second stage is placed to face the projection optical system instead of the third stage while substantially maintaining the liquid immersion area under the lens; moving a movable optical element of the plurality of optical elements so that an optical property of the projection optical system is adjusted; and moving the first and the second stages so that, in an exposure operation of the substrate held by the second stage, scanning exposure in which the mask and the substrate are each moved relative to the illumination light is performed with the first direction serving as a scanning direction, via the projection optical system and the liquid of the liquid immersion area, wherein, in the exposure operation, the substrate is placed to face the lower surface of the nozzle member by the second stage, and the measurement beam is irradiated on each of at least three scale members of the plurality of scale members, by the second measurement device, and during the scanning exposure, the second stage is moved based on measurement information of the second measurement device so that focus-levelling control of a pattern image of the mask, that is projected via the projection optical system and the liquid of the liquid immersion area, and the substrate is performed based on detection information of the detection device.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 83.0
- Percentile: 97.0
- Lexical Diversity: 1.91228
- Patent Class: 355.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: True
- Related Applications: ['15687003', '15675037', '15686718', '15678674', '15678660']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.7843289898002096
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.5975295222800725
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.7656490430481959
- Mean Citation Score: 404.475108
- Max Citation Score: 419.24802
- Similarity Product: 385.63904047616967

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test