PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 16144075
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-09
Publication Date: 2019-01
Patent Classification: ["438", "795000"]

Abstract:
Over a front surface of a silicon semiconductor wafer is deposited a high dielectric constant film with a silicon oxide film, serving as an interface layer, provided between the semiconductor wafer and the high dielectric constant film. After a chamber houses the semiconductor wafer, a chamber's pressure is reduced to be lower than atmospheric pressure. Subsequently, a gaseous mixture of ammonia and nitrogen gas is supplied into the chamber to return the pressure to ordinary pressure, and the front surface is irradiated with a flash light, thereby performing post deposition annealing (PDA) on the high dielectric constant film. Since the pressure is reduced once to be lower than atmospheric pressure and then returned to ordinary pressure, a chamber's oxygen concentration is lowered remarkably during the PDA. This restricts an increase in thickness of the silicon oxide film underlying the high dielectric constant film by oxygen taken in during the PDA.

Claim (Index 7):
A method of irradiating a substrate including a high dielectric constant film deposited thereover with a flash of light to heat said substrate, the method comprising:\n (a) transporting a substrate including a high dielectric constant film deposited thereover into a chamber; (b) reducing a pressure in said chamber to a first pressure lower than atmospheric pressure; (c) returning the pressure in said chamber from the first pressure to a second pressure higher than the first pressure to make an oxygen concentration in said chamber not greater than 200 ppb; and (d) irradiating a front surface of said substrate with a flash of light from a flash lamp while maintaining the pressure in said chamber at the second pressure and maintaining the oxygen concentration in said chamber not greater than 200 ppb.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 50.0
- Percentile: 97.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.15584
- Patent Class: 438.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: True
- Related Applications: ['15245662', '15648634', '15242709', '14975992', '16048020']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.8675594948993801
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.5164202372663546
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.8324455691360775
- Mean Citation Score: 287.8787660000001
- Max Citation Score: 329.59753
- Similarity Product: 292.67956535267183

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