Patent application number | Description | Published |
20080273200 | MEASUREMENT METHOD, MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE FABRICATION METHOD - A measurement method of measuring a wavefront aberration of an optical system to be measured, comprising a first measurement step of measuring wavefronts of the optical system to be measured with respect to linearly polarized light beams along at least three different azimuths, a first calculation step of calculating a wavefront of the optical system to be measured with respect to non-polarized light and a birefringent characteristic of the optical system to be measured, based on the wavefronts of the optical system to be measured, which are measured in the first measurement step, and a second calculation step of calculating a wavefront of the optical system to be measured with respect to arbitrary polarized light, based on the wavefront and the birefringent characteristic of the optical system to be measured, which are calculated in the first calculation step. | 11-06-2008 |
20090257037 | MEASUREMENT METHOD, MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE FABRICATION METHOD - The present invention provides a measurement method of measuring imaging performance of a projection optics which projects a reticle pattern onto a substrate, including a measurement step of measuring the imaging performance of the projection optics, and a calculation step of calculating the imaging performance of the projection optics in a predetermined environment different from a measurement environment in which the measurement step is performed, based on information indicating a rate of change of the imaging performance of the projection optics with respect to a physical quantity which changes the imaging performance of the projection optics, a physical quantity in the measurement environment, a physical quantity in the predetermined environment, and the imaging performance of the projection optics measured in the measurement step. | 10-15-2009 |
20090268181 | MEASUREMENT METHOD AND EXPOSURE APPARATUS - A method of measuring an optical characteristic of an optical system using a measurement apparatus, comprises determining a position of each of object points by arranging, on a side of the object plane, an object point measurement device array, and sequentially inserting the object point measurement devices in an optical path, determining a position of each of image points by arranging, on a side of the image plane, an image point measurement device array, and sequentially inserting the image point measurement devices in the optical path, calculating an error attributed to the measurement apparatus based on the positions of object points and the positions of the image points, obtaining a measured value by measurement to obtain information representing the optical characteristic of the optical system using the measurement apparatus, and correcting the measured value based on the error. | 10-29-2009 |
20090296059 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, MEASUREMENT METHOD, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE FABRICATION METHOD - The present invention provides a measurement apparatus which measures a wavefront aberration of a measurement target optical system, the apparatus including a fringe scanning unit configured to perform fringe scanning by changing a phase difference between test light and reference light, a determination unit configured to determine a nonlinear error representing a nonlinear change in feature amount, which is derived from an interference pattern between the test light and the reference light, with respect to predetermined control data by performing fringe scanning by the fringe scanning unit in accordance with the control data in a plurality of phase states, and a correction unit configured to correct, based on the nonlinear error determined by the determination unit, a wavefront aberration of the measurement target optical system calculated from the interference pattern between the test light and the reference light. | 12-03-2009 |
20090316123 | INJECTION-LOCKED LASER, INTERFEROMETER, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE MANUFACTURING METHOD - An injection-locked laser is disclosed. The injection-locked laser comprises a seed laser, an oscillator into which a certain component of light output from the seed laser is injected as seed laser light, a frequency converter which shifts a frequency of the remaining component of the light output from the seed laser, a photodetector which detects light obtained by synthesizing the light output from the oscillator and the light output from the frequency converter, and a controller which controls an optical path length of the oscillator based on a beat signal component contained in the signal output from the photodetector. | 12-24-2009 |
20100002243 | APPARATUSES AND METHODS USING MEASUREMENT OF A FLARE GENERATED IN AN OPTICAL SYSTEM - The present invention provides a method including measuring a wavefront aberration of the optical system to be measured on a measurement surface, measuring a pupil transmittance distribution of the optical system determining a pupil function of the optical system based on the wavefront aberration and the pupil transmittance distribution, and performing imaging computation using the pupil function to obtain a light intensity distribution formed on an image plane of the optical system, and calculating a flare, generated in the optical system, from the light intensity distribution. | 01-07-2010 |
20100068634 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE MANUFACTURING METHOD - A measurement apparatus comprises a mirror configured to reflect test light which passes through an optical system, an interferometer unit which includes an image sensor and is configured to form an interference fringe on an image sensing plane of the image sensor by reference light and the test light reflected by the mirror, and a controller configured to control the interferometer unit, and to compute a numerical aperture of the optical system based on the interference fringe captured by the image sensor, wherein the controller is configured to compute a numerical aperture NA of the optical system by multiplying a quotient ΔNA/ΔR, describing a change ΔNA in numerical aperture NA of the optical system with respect to a change ΔR in pupil radius R of the optical system in the image sensing plane, by the pupil radius R of the optical system in the image sensing plane. | 03-18-2010 |
20100110444 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS - The present invention provides a measurement apparatus which measures a distance between a reference surface fixed on a fiducial surface and a test surface located on a test object, the apparatus including an optical frequency comb generation unit configured to generate a light beam with a plurality of optical frequency components, which have equal optical frequency separations therebetween, a detection unit configured to, for at least two of the plurality of optical frequency components, detect an interference signal between a light beam reflected by the reference surface and a light beam reflected by the test surface to detect a phase corresponding to an optical path length between the reference surface and the test surface, and a calculation unit configured to calculate a geometric distance between the reference surface and the test surface based on the phases detected by the detection unit. | 05-06-2010 |
20100225924 | OPTICAL INTERFERENCE MEASURING APPARATUS - An optical interference measuring apparatus comprises a first multiple-wavelength light source | 09-09-2010 |
20100233636 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND METHOD OF MANUFACTURING DEVICE - A measurement apparatus comprises: a light source; a first optical system configured to reflect a certain component of a light beam emitted by the light source by a final surface thereof and transmit a remaining component of the light beam; a reflecting surface configured to reflect the remaining component; an optical member configured to generate a first shearing interference fringe formed by the certain component, and a second shearing interference fringe formed by the remaining component; an image sensing unit configured to simultaneously sense the first and second shearing interference fringes generated by the optical member; and an arithmetic unit configured to calculate, a wavefront aberration of the first optical system and a wavefront aberration of the first optical system and an optical system to be measured, using data on the first and second shearing interference fringes, thereby calculating a wavefront aberration of the optical system to be measured. | 09-16-2010 |
20100265515 | MEASUREMENT METHOD, MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE FABRICATION METHOD - A measurement method of measuring a wavefront aberration of an optical system to be measured, comprising a first measurement step of measuring wavefronts of the optical system to be measured with respect to linearly polarized light beams along at least three different azimuths, a first calculation step of calculating a wavefront of the optical system to be measured with respect to non-polarized light and a birefringent characteristic of the optical system to be measured, based on the wavefronts of the optical system to be measured, which are measured in the first measurement step, and a second calculation step of calculating a wavefront of the optical system to be measured with respect to arbitrary polarized light, based on the wavefront and the birefringent characteristic of the optical system to be measured, which are calculated in the first calculation step. | 10-21-2010 |
20110027723 | MEASURING APPARATUS, OPTICAL SYSTEM MANUFACTURING METHOD, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, DEVICE MANUFACTURING METHOD, AND PROCESSING APPARATUS - The present invention provides a processing apparatus which executes sampling of data and represents the sampled data by linear combination of orthogonal functions, the apparatus including a device configured to execute the sampling, and a processor configured to process the data sampled by the device, wherein the processor is configured, if the data sampled by the device includes an invalid sampling point, to obtain a degree of break of orthogonality of an orthogonal function system caused by the invalid sampling point, and to evaluate reliability of the sampling based on the obtained degree. | 02-03-2011 |
20110102805 | MEASURING APPARATUS - The present invention provides a measuring apparatus for measuring an absolute distance between a reference surface and a test surface, including a phase detection unit configured to detect an interference signal between light reflected by the reference surface and light reflected by the test surface, and detect, from the interference signal, a phase corresponding to an optical path length between the reference surface and the test surface, and a processing unit configured to perform processing of obtaining the absolute distance by controlling the phase detection unit so as to detect the phase corresponding to the optical path length between the reference surface and the test surface for each of a first reference wavelength and a second reference wavelength while changing the wavelength of light to be emitted by a first light source continuously from the first reference wavelength to the second reference wavelength. | 05-05-2011 |
20110134408 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS, EXPOSURE APPARATUS, AND DEVICE FABRICATION METHOD - The present invention provides a measurement apparatus which measures an imaging performance of an optical system to be measured, the apparatus including a first reference substrate which is placed on an object plane of the optical system to be measured, and has periodic patterns arranged in accordance with a plurality of object heights, a second reference substrate which is placed on an image plane of the optical system to be measured, and has apertures which pass light from the periodic patterns, a detection unit configured to detect an intensity of the light which comes from the periodic patterns and has passed through the apertures, a driving unit configured to drive at least one of the first reference substrate and the second reference substrate, and a processing unit configured to perform a process for obtaining the imaging performance of the optical system to be measured. | 06-09-2011 |
20110211198 | LIGHTWAVE INTERFERENCE MEASUREMENT APPARATUS THAT CALCULATES ABSOLUTE DISTANCE USING LIGHTWAVE INTERFERENCE - A lightwave interference measurement apparatus includes a wavelength-variable laser which periodically performs wavelength scanning between first and second reference wavelengths to emit light beam, a wavelength-fixed laser which emits light beam having a third reference wavelength, a light beam splitting element which splits the light beams into reference light beam and light beam under test, a phase detector which detects a phase based on an interference signal of the reference light beam and the light beam under test, and an analyzer which sequentially determines an interference order of the third reference wavelength based on the third reference wavelength, first and second synthetic wavelengths, an integer component of a phase change amount in the wavelength scanning, and interference orders of the first and second synthetic wavelengths, and calculates an absolute distance between the surface under test and the reference surface. | 09-01-2011 |
20110216326 | LIGHTWAVE INTERFERENCE MEASUREMENT APPARATUS USED TO MEASURE OPTICAL PATH LENGTH OR DISTANCE - A lightwave interference measurement apparatus includes a phase detector configured to detect a phase of a signal of an interference between light from a distance-measurement light source and reflected on a reference surface and light from the distance-measurement light source and reflected on a target surface, an intensity detector configured to detect an intensity of light from a non-distance-measurement light source having a wavelength different from that of the distance-measurement light source and reflected on the reference surface and an intensity of light from the non-distance-measurement light source and reflected on the target surface, and an analyzer configured to calculate a geometric distance based on an optical path length calculated from the phase and a wavelength of the distance-measurement light source, and an average value of a vapor pressure distribution between the target surface and the reference surface calculated from intensity information of the light from the non-distance-measurement light source. | 09-08-2011 |
20120044500 | OPTICAL INTERFEROMETER - An optical interferometer including, an analyzer configured to calculate an air dispersion ratio of air in the dispersion measurement interferometer excluding the component gas on the basis of a detection result of a first partial pressure detector, to calculate dispersion of air in a distance measurement interferometer from the calculated air dispersion ratio and a detection result of a second partial pressure detector, and to calculate a geometrical distance of the optical path length difference between a reference surface and a target surface. | 02-23-2012 |
20120113434 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS - A measurement apparatus which measures a distance between a reference surface and a test surface, comprises a light source unit including a plurality of light sources each corresponding to one of a plurality of wavelength scanning ranges and each continuously scans a wavelength of generated light in the corresponding wavelength scanning range, an interferometer unit which splits light emitted by each of the plurality of light sources into reference light and test light, and detects, as an interference signal, an interference fringe formed by the reference light and the test light, and a processor which determines a slope of a phase of the interference signal with respect to wave number of the light based on the interference signal detected by the interferometer unit for each of the plurality of wavelength scanning ranges, and determines the distance from the slope of the phase. | 05-10-2012 |
20120116718 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS - The present invention provides a measurement apparatus which measures a distance between a reference surface and a surface to be measured, including a wavelength reference element configured to include a gas cell in which a plurality of types of gases having absorption lines different from each other are sealed, and a processing unit configured to set a wavelength of light emitted by a light source to a plurality of different wavelengths corresponding to a plurality of different absorption lines by using the wavelength reference element, control a phase detection unit to detect a phase corresponding to an optical path length between the reference surface and the surface to be measured for each of the plurality of different wavelengths, and perform processing of obtaining the distance. | 05-10-2012 |
20120127477 | INTERFEROMETER AND DISTANCE CALCULATION METHOD THEREFOR - A method of calculating a geometrical distance of a test optical path on the basis of interfering a test beam and a reference beam includes an optical-path-length calculating step of calculating an optical path length of the test optical paths having different wavelengths by using the interfering beam having mutually different wavelengths, a refractive-index calculating step of calculating the refractive index of the test optical path on the basis of the optical path length of the test optical path calculated by the optical-path-length calculating step, a smoothing step of smoothing a plurality of refractive indices acquired by repeating the optical-path-length calculating step and the refractive-index calculating step to calculate a smoothed refractive index, and a geometrical distance calculating step of calculating the geometrical distance of the test optical path on the basis of the smoothed refractive index calculated by the smoothing step. | 05-24-2012 |
20130063728 | MEASURING APPARATUS - A measuring apparatus includes an optical frequency comb source configured to emit an optical frequency comb in which a plurality of frequency components are arranged at equal frequency intervals, a beam splitter configured to split a beam emitted from the optical frequency comb source into a test beam to be irradiated onto a test surface and a reference beam to be irradiated onto a reference surface, an optical path difference changing element configured to change an optical path difference between the reference beam and the test beam, an image sensor configured to capture an interference pattern formed by interference between the test beam and the reference beam, and an analyzer configured to calculate a position of the test surface based upon a signal of the interference pattern captured while the optical path length difference is being changed by the optical path difference changing element. | 03-14-2013 |
20130155414 | MEASURING APPARATUS INCLUDING MULTI-WAVELENGTH INTERFEROMETER - A measuring apparatus for measuring a position or a shape of a surface to be inspected includes a multi-wavelength interferometer and a control unit. The multi-wavelength interferometer includes an optical system that causes light to be inspected, which enters the surface to be inspected and is reflected by the surface to be inspected, and reference light to interfere with each other, a spectroscopic unit that divides interference light between the light to be inspected and the reference light into each wavelength, and a detector that detects the interference light and is provided for each divided interference light and an optical member that can adjust a position of a light guide portion that guides light from the spectroscopic unit to the detector. The control unit controls the optical member by using information related to inclination of the surface to be inspected to adjust the position of the light guide portion. | 06-20-2013 |
20140182150 | MEASUREMENT APPARATUS AND MEASUREMENT METHOD - The present invention provides a measurement apparatus for measuring a shape of an object to be measured, comprising a measuring head configured to perform measurement in a first measurement mode and perform measurement in a second measurement mode having measurement accuracy higher than that of the first measurement mode, a detection unit configured to detect an occupancy region of the object to be measured, and a control unit configured to control the measuring head, wherein in the first measurement mode, the control unit moves, based on a detection result of the detection unit, the measuring head not to touch the object to be measured, and in the second measurement mode, the control unit moves, based on a measurement result in the first measurement mode, the measuring head to satisfy an allowable condition in the second measurement mode. | 07-03-2014 |
20150057972 | MEASURING APPARATUS AND MEASURING METHOD - Provided is a measuring apparatus that a beam splitter configured to split the first beam into test light and reference light and a beam multiplexer configured to multiplex the test light reflected by an object to be tested and the reference light are separately provided, and a beam guiding unit configured to guide the second beam to the object to be tested is disposed on the optical path of the test light between the beam splitter and the beam multiplexer or between the beam multiplexer and the detector. | 02-26-2015 |