Paper
24 March 2017 Excimer laser gas usage reduction technology for semiconductor manufacturing
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
ArF and KrF excimer lasers are widely used as a light source for the lithography process of semiconductor manufacturing. The excimer lasers consume laser gas mixture in a discharge chamber as laser media, and more than 96% of the gas mixture is Neon. Recently Neon supply and demand balance became critical situation; the price has risen two years ago due to the instability of politics and economy in Ukraine. Although Neon price decreased now, its price is still higher than two years ago. Gigaphoton has released gas consumption reduction, called Total Gas Management (TGM) series, as part of the green activities. Conventional gas consumption reduction (eTGM) achieved 50% gas consumption reductions from the former gas control (sTGM) by optimizing the laser gas control.

In order to reduce gas consumption further, Gigaphoton has been developing new gas recycle system hTGM. hTGM purifies used gas so that laser can use it repeatedly. Field evaluation of KrF-hTGM system has been started. The system was connected to five KrF laser systems and achieved 85% of the gas recycling ratio, keeping stable laser performance. Also, internal evaluation of ArF-hTGM system has been started. The system was connected to one ArF laser and achieved 92% of the gas recycling ratio, keeping stable laser performance.
© (2017) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Masanori Yashiro, Takuma Oouchi, Hiroaki Tsushima, Akihiko Kurosu, Takeshi Ohta, Takashi Matsunaga, and Hakaru Mizoguchi "Excimer laser gas usage reduction technology for semiconductor manufacturing", Proc. SPIE 10147, Optical Microlithography XXX, 101471O (24 March 2017); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2257972
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Cited by 2 patents.
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KEYWORDS
Gas lasers

Excimer lasers

Neon

Laser systems engineering

Semiconductor manufacturing

Lithography

Laser stabilization

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