CN217009129U

CN217009129U - Semiconductor cleaning equipment

Info

Publication number: CN217009129U
Application number: CN202220192461.3U
Authority: CN
Inventors: 张虎威; 高少飞; 南建辉; 张金斌
Original assignee: Beijing Naura Microelectronics Equipment Co Ltd
Current assignee: Beijing Naura Microelectronics Equipment Co Ltd
Priority date: 2022-01-24
Filing date: 2022-01-24
Publication date: 2022-07-19
Anticipated expiration: 2032-01-24

Abstract

The present invention provides a semiconductor cleaning apparatus, comprising: the wafer cleaning device comprises a wafer cleaning unit, a drying unit and a loading and unloading unit, wherein the loading and unloading unit is used for loading and unloading wafers; the cleaning device comprises a first manipulator, a second manipulator and a hand washing unit, wherein the hand washing unit is used for cleaning and/or drying the first manipulator, a wafer temporary storage structure is arranged in the hand washing unit and used for temporarily storing a wafer to be cleaned, the first manipulator is used for conveying the wafer to be cleaned to the wafer temporary storage structure through a loading and unloading unit, the cleaned wafer is conveyed to a drying unit through a wafer cleaning unit after being cleaned through the hand washing unit, the dried wafer is conveyed to the loading and unloading unit through the drying unit after being dried through the hand washing unit, and the second manipulator is used for conveying the wafer to be cleaned to a wafer cleaning unit through the wafer temporary storage structure. The first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm are matched for scheduling, so that the wafer transmission efficiency is improved, and the equipment capacity is improved.

Description

Semiconductor cleaning equipment

Technical Field

The utility model relates to the technical field of semiconductor processing, in particular to a semiconductor cleaning device.

Background

As shown in fig. 1, the conventional semiconductor cleaning apparatus includes a loading and unloading module 1, a drying module 2, a hand washing module 3, a plurality of cleaning modules 4 (including an acid tank 4-1 and a water tank 4-2), and a robot 5, which are sequentially arranged adjacent to each other. Wherein the robot 5 is used to transfer wafers between different modules, however, the robot 5 requires washing hands by the hand washing modules 3 before transferring wafers between certain modules, "washing hands" includes washing and/or drying the robot 5.

When the above semiconductor cleaning apparatus is used, the basic transfer flow of the robot 5 for cleaning one wafer is roughly as follows: the robot 5 picks up the wafer (i.e., dirty wafer) to be cleaned in the loading and unloading module 1, and transfers the wafer to at least one cleaning module 4 for pickling and washing in steps. After the cleaning, the wafer needs to be transferred to the drying module 2 for drying, and before that, the robot 5 needs to move to the hand washing module 3 for cleaning and drying, so as to capture the cleaned wafer and transfer the wafer to the drying module 2. After the drying is finished, the wafer needs to be placed back to the loading and unloading module 1, before the wafer is cleaned and dried (the robot 5 touches dirty pieces before) or only dried (the robot 5 does not touch dirty pieces before) by moving the robot 5 to the hand washing module 3, the dried wafer can be grabbed, and the wafer is placed back to the loading and unloading module 1.

In the practical application process of equipment, the requirement of high-yield process is often required to be met. That is, the apparatus needs to perform the cleaning operation for a plurality of wafers at the same time, i.e., a plurality of the above-described basic transfer flows of the robot 5 are performed alternately in the same period of time. Ideally, the robot 5 should perform the transferring motion continuously, so that the wafer transferring efficiency can be improved, thereby satisfying the requirement of high-throughput process. Because the process time lengths of different modules are different, in the process of crossing a plurality of basic transmission flows, it is difficult to realize that two adjacent actions executed by the manipulator 5 are tightly connected, and if the next action to be executed is not started after the current action executed by the manipulator 5 is finished, the manipulator 5 needs to perform stop waiting at this time. The "stay waiting" time period depends on the scheduling scheme of the robot 5, and the scheduling scheme is designed according to the sequence of the wafers entering each module, the process time period of each module and other factors.

However, in the above conventional semiconductor cleaning apparatus, the wafer is transferred between the modules by the robot 5, and since the robot 5 needs to wash hands in the hand washing module 3 before transferring the cleaned wafer and the dried wafer, there is a limit to the scheduling scheme design of the robot 5, and a long waiting time is likely to occur between two adjacent operations performed by the robot.

For example, after the hand 5 washes hands through the hand washing module 3, in order to avoid the hand 5 from being contaminated again, the next action performed by the hand 5 is usually to transfer the cleaned wafer (or to transfer the dried wafer), and therefore, when the scheduling plan of the hand 5 is designed, even if there is a long interval between the end of the hand washing action of the hand 5 and the start of the action of transferring the cleaned wafer (or transferring the dried wafer), the hand 5 cannot perform the action of transferring the wafer to be cleaned, and can only perform the stay waiting within the "long interval".

Therefore, when the robot 5 executes the operation according to the determined scheduling scheme, a long stop waiting is easily generated between two adjacent operations, and during the time, the semiconductor cleaning device completely stops the wafer transferring operation, so that the wafer transferring efficiency is low, and a certain degree of capacity limitation is caused, and the high-throughput process requirement cannot be met.

SUMMERY OF THE UTILITY MODEL

The utility model aims to solve at least one technical problem in the prior art and provides a semiconductor cleaning device.

The present invention provides a semiconductor cleaning apparatus for cleaning a wafer, comprising: the wafer cleaning unit is used for cleaning a wafer to be cleaned, the drying unit is used for drying the cleaned wafer, and the loading and unloading unit is used for loading the wafer to be cleaned and unloading the dried wafer; the hand washing device comprises a first manipulator, a second manipulator and a hand washing unit, wherein the hand washing unit is used for washing and/or drying the first manipulator, a wafer temporary storage structure is arranged in the hand washing unit and used for temporarily storing a wafer to be washed, the first manipulator is used for conveying the wafer to be washed to the wafer temporary storage structure from a loading and unloading unit, the wafer to be washed is also used for conveying the wafer to be washed to a drying unit from a wafer washing unit after being washed by the hand washing unit, the wafer to be dried is also used for conveying the wafer to be dried to the loading and unloading unit from the drying unit after being dried by the hand washing unit, and the second manipulator is used for conveying the wafer to be washed to a wafer washing unit from the wafer temporary storage structure.

Further, the hand washing unit comprises a hand washing cavity and a spraying type hand washing structure arranged in the hand washing cavity, the spraying type hand washing structure comprises a blowing structure and a spraying structure, the blowing structure is used for spraying gas, the spraying structure is used for spraying liquid, the wafer temporary storage structure is arranged in the hand washing cavity and comprises a placing part and a driving part, the driving part is used for driving the placing part to lift so that the placing part can move to a temporary storage position and an avoiding position in the vertical direction, when the placing part is located at the temporary storage position, the top surface of the placing part is higher than the spraying type hand washing structure, or the top surface of the placing part is flush with the top surface of the spraying type hand washing structure, so that the placing part can place wafers to be washed; when the placing part is in the avoiding position, the placing part is lower than the spraying type hand washing structure so as to avoid the spraying type hand washing structure.

Further, spray type structure of washing hand is two that set up along the horizontal direction interval, wash the hand in every spray type structure, it sets up along vertical direction interval with the structure of spraying to sweep the structure, first manipulator sets up and two first clamping parts of aperture adjustable including the interval, two spray type structure of washing hand's of spraying the structure spray the structure and be used for spraying respectively two first clamping parts and wash, two spray type structure of washing hand sweep the structure be used for weathering two first clamping parts respectively, the portion of placing goes up and down in two vertical spaces that spray type washed hand and correspond between the structure.

Further, the hand washing unit also comprises a hand washing groove, the hand washing groove is arranged in the hand washing cavity and is positioned below the spraying type hand washing structure, the first wafer clamping end of the first clamping part extends into the hand washing groove to be washed, and when the placing part is positioned at the avoiding position, the placing part is lower than the top surface of the hand washing groove.

Further, the driving part includes: the mounting seat is fixedly arranged on the wall of the hand washing chamber; the guide piece is fixedly arranged on the mounting seat, and the sliding piece is movably arranged on the guide piece along the vertical direction; the supporting piece is connected between the placing part and the sliding piece and extends along the vertical direction; and the driving source is in driving connection with the sliding piece and/or the supporting piece so as to drive the sliding piece, the supporting piece and the placing part to move along the vertical direction.

Further, the guide part is a plurality of, and a plurality of guide parts set up along horizontal direction interval, and the slider is movably set up on a plurality of guide parts.

Further, the guide member is two, and the two guide members are symmetrically arranged with respect to the support member.

Furthermore, the placing part comprises a plurality of bearing support plates arranged at intervals in the horizontal direction, an arc-shaped bearing groove is formed in the top of each bearing support plate and used for being matched with the edge of the wafer, and the arc-shaped bearing grooves in the plurality of bearing support plates are located on the same circumference.

Further, the wafer cleaning unit comprises a plurality of cleaning sub-units, the cleaning sub-units are sequentially and adjacently arranged along the horizontal direction, the wafer cleaning unit, the hand washing unit, the drying unit and the feeding and discharging unit are sequentially and adjacently arranged along the horizontal direction, and the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm can move along the horizontal direction.

Further, each cleaning subunit comprises a chemical liquid groove and a water groove, and the distance between the water groove and the hand washing unit is smaller than the distance between the chemical liquid groove and the hand washing unit.

The utility model has the following beneficial effects:

the semiconductor cleaning equipment provided by the utility model comprises a first manipulator and a second manipulator, wherein the first manipulator and the second manipulator adopt a division and cooperation mode, namely the first manipulator and the second manipulator are respectively used for being responsible for different conveying actions of wafers. However, the first robot and the second robot are engaged with each other to transfer and receive wafers therebetween. In order to solve the problem, wash the inside wafer structure of keeping in that sets up of unit of washing hand, this wafer structure of keeping in is used for temporarily depositing the wafer that waits to wash that first manipulator conveying comes at least, the second manipulator can snatch this wafer of depositing in the wafer structure of keeping in, compare in not setting up the wafer structure of keeping in and directly transmit the mode for the second manipulator with the wafer through first manipulator, wafer structure of keeping in is provided with and does benefit to and reduces the mutual restriction between first manipulator and the second manipulator, the design of the scheduling scheme of being convenient for more.

The first manipulator and the second manipulator are matched in a division way, and the action processes of the first manipulator and the second manipulator can be simultaneously carried out. The first robot arm performs the transfer operation of the cleaned wafer and the dried wafer, however, even if the first robot arm has a long stay waiting time between performing two adjacent operations, for example, the first robot arm needs to stay waiting for a certain time after the hand washing operation (cleaning and/or drying) performed by the hand washing unit is finished and before the next transfer operation of the cleaned wafer or the dried wafer is started, during which the semiconductor cleaning apparatus does not completely stop the transfer operation of the wafer, the second robot arm can completely continue to perform the transfer operation such as transferring the wafer to be cleaned from the wafer temporary storage structure to the wafer cleaning unit. Therefore, compared with the existing semiconductor cleaning equipment, the semiconductor cleaning equipment is more beneficial to improving the wafer transmission efficiency.

Based on the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm which are respectively used for being responsible for the conveying action of the wafer and the temporary storage function of the wafer temporary storage structure on the wafer, the scheduling schemes of the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm are reasonably designed according to the sequence of the wafer entering each process unit, the process duration of each process unit and other factors, the condition that the semiconductor cleaning equipment completely stops the conveying action on the wafer can be reduced or avoided as far as possible, namely the condition that the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm stop waiting at the same time is reduced or avoided, under an ideal state, in the working process of the semiconductor cleaning equipment, at least one of the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm is always in the conveying state on the wafer, the conveying efficiency of the wafer is greatly improved, the capacity of the equipment is improved, and the high-capacity process requirements are met.

In addition, the wafer temporary storage structure is arranged inside the hand washing unit, and compared with the condition that the wafer temporary storage structure is arranged outside the hand washing unit, the wafer temporary storage structure is beneficial to reducing the occupied space of a machine table of the semiconductor cleaning equipment and the scheduling range of the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm, so that the time spent by the first mechanical arm and the second mechanical arm when the wafers are conveyed is saved, and the wafer temporary storage structure is further beneficial to improving the wafer transmission efficiency. In addition, the wafer cleaning unit, the drying unit, the loading and unloading unit and the hand washing unit are provided with structures which facilitate alignment of the first manipulator and/or the second manipulator. If the wafer escrow structure is provided outside the hand washing unit, it is also necessary to provide alignment-related structures at the location of the wafer escrow structure. The temporary wafer storage structure is arranged inside the hand washing unit, so that the structure related to alignment does not need to be added, and cost is reduced.

Drawings

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a semiconductor cleaning apparatus according to the prior art;

FIG. 2 is a schematic structural diagram of a semiconductor cleaning apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a schematic view showing a hand washing unit and a temporary wafer storage structure of the semiconductor cleaning apparatus of FIG. 2 in a state of temporarily storing wafers, wherein a placing portion of the temporary wafer storage structure is in a temporary storage position and wafers are placed on the placing portion;

FIG. 4 is a schematic view of the hand washing unit and wafer temporary storage structure of FIG. 3 in a state where the first robot arm is gripping a temporarily stored wafer;

FIG. 5 is a schematic view of the hand washing unit and wafer temporary storage structure of FIG. 4 in a state where the first robot arm grasps a temporarily stored wafer and the placing portion is lowered to the retracted position;

FIG. 6 is a schematic view of the hand washing unit and wafer temporary storage structure of FIG. 5 after a temporary storage wafer has been removed by the first robot;

fig. 7 is a schematic view of the hand washing unit and the wafer temporary storage structure of fig. 6 in a state where the placing section is in the retracted position and the hand washing unit cleans the first robot.

Detailed Description

In order to make those skilled in the art better understand the technical solution of the present invention, the semiconductor cleaning apparatus provided by the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

As shown in fig. 2, the present invention provides a semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100, the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 being used for cleaning a wafer 200. In some embodiments, the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 includes a wafer cleaning unit 20, a drying unit 70, a loading and unloading unit 10, a first robot arm 30, a second robot arm 40, and a hand washing unit 50. The wafer cleaning unit 20 is used for cleaning the wafer 200 to be cleaned, the drying unit 70 is used for drying the cleaned wafer 200, the loading and unloading unit 10 is used for loading the wafer 200 to be cleaned and unloading the dried wafer 200, and the first robot arm 30 and the second robot arm 40 are used for conveying the wafer 200. The hand washing unit 50 is used at least for washing and/or drying the first robot 30.

In contrast to the conventional semiconductor cleaning apparatus, the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 of the above embodiment includes the first robot 30 and the second robot 40, and the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are in a division coordination manner, that is, the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are respectively responsible for different transfer operations of the wafer 200. However, the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 may be engaged with each other to transfer and receive the wafer 200 therebetween. For example, the first robot 30 is used to pick and transfer the wafer 200 to be cleaned in the loading and unloading unit 10, and the second robot 40 is used to transfer the wafer 200 to be cleaned to the wafer cleaning unit 20, which involves a problem of how the second robot 40 picks the wafer 200 to be cleaned transferred from the first robot 30. In order to solve the problem of the connection between the first robot arm 30 and the second robot arm 40, a wafer temporary storage structure 60 is disposed inside the hand washing unit 50, the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is at least used for temporarily storing the wafer 200 to be cleaned, which is transferred by the first robot arm 30, and the second robot arm 40 can grab the stored wafer 200 on the wafer temporary storage structure 60, compared with a mode that the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is not disposed and the wafer 200 is directly transferred to the second robot arm 40 by the first robot arm 30, the arrangement of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is beneficial to reducing the mutual restriction between the first robot arm 30 and the second robot arm 40, and is more convenient for designing a scheduling scheme.

Specifically, the first robot 30 is responsible for the wafer 200 transfer actions including at least: the first robot 30 is used for transferring the wafer 200 to be cleaned from the loading and unloading unit 10 to the wafer temporary storage structure 60, the first robot 30 is also used for transferring the cleaned wafer 200 from the wafer cleaning unit 20 to the drying unit 70 after being cleaned by the hand washing unit 50, and the first robot 30 is also used for transferring the dried wafer 200 from the drying unit 70 to the loading and unloading unit 10 after being dried by the hand washing unit 50. The second robot 40 is responsible for the transfer of the wafer 200 and includes at least: the second robot 40 is used to transfer the wafer 200 to be cleaned from the wafer escrow structure 60 to the wafer cleaning unit 20.

As a result, the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are separately operated and matched, and the operation processes of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 can be performed simultaneously. The transfer operations for the cleaned wafer 200 and the dried wafer 200 are performed by the first robot arm 30, however, even if the first robot arm 30 has a long stay waiting between performing any two adjacent operations, for example, the first robot arm 30 needs to stay waiting for a certain period of time after the hand washing operation (cleaning and/or blow-drying) performed by the hand washing unit 50 is completed and before the next transfer operation for the cleaned wafer 200 or the dried wafer 200 is started, during which the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 does not completely stop the transfer operation for the wafer 200, the second robot arm 40 can completely continue the transfer operation such as transferring the wafer 200 to be cleaned from the wafer temporary storage structure 60 to the wafer cleaning unit 20. Therefore, the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 described above is more advantageous to improve the transfer efficiency of the wafer 200 than the conventional semiconductor cleaning apparatus.

Based on the above-mentioned functions of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 respectively responsible for the wafer 200 transferring operation and the temporary storage of the wafer 200 by the temporary storage structure 60, according to the sequence of the wafer 200 entering each process unit, the process time of each process unit and other factors, the scheduling schemes of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are designed appropriately, so that the situation that the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 completely stops the transferring operation of the wafer 200 can be reduced or avoided as much as possible, i.e., the situation where the first robot arm 30 and the second robot arm 40 stay waiting at the same time is reduced or avoided, it is desirable that, in a state where, during the operation of the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100, there is always a state where at least one of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 is in a transferring state to the wafer 200, thereby greatly improving the transmission efficiency of the wafer 200, increasing the equipment productivity, and further satisfying the high-throughput process requirement.

In addition, the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is disposed inside the hand washing unit 50, which is beneficial to reducing the occupied space of the machine table of the semiconductor cleaning device and the dispatching range of the first manipulator 30 and the second manipulator 40 compared to the case that the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is disposed outside the hand washing unit 50, thereby saving the time spent by the first manipulator 30 and the second manipulator 40 in the transferring operation, and further being beneficial to improving the transmission efficiency of the wafer 200. In addition, the wafer cleaning unit 20, the drying unit 70, the loading and unloading unit 10, and the hand washing unit 50 are provided with structures for facilitating alignment of the first robot arm 30 and/or the second robot arm 40. If wafer escrow structure 60 is located outside hand wash unit 50, alignment related structures may also be required at the location of wafer escrow structure 60. By locating wafer staging structure 60 within hand washing unit 50, the alignment-related structure described above need not be added, thereby facilitating cost savings.

The respective transfer operations of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 for taking charge of the wafer 200 are not limited to the above-described transfer operations, and may be appropriately designed according to actual needs in other embodiments; in addition, the hand washing unit 50 is not limited to cleaning and/or drying the first robot 30, and in other embodiments, the hand washing unit 50 may also clean and/or dry the second robot 40. Further, it should be noted that, before the first robot 30 performs the transferring operation of the cleaned wafer 200 from the wafer cleaning unit 20 to the drying unit 70, if the first robot 30 touches the wafer 200 to be cleaned (i.e., dirty wafer) or other substances (e.g., chemical cleaning solution in the wafer cleaning unit 20) which may contaminate the wafer 200, the first robot 30 needs to be cleaned and dried or only cleaned by the hand cleaning unit 50. Before the first robot 30 performs the transferring operation of the dried wafer 200 from the drying unit 70 to the loading unit 10, if the first robot 30 touches the wafer 200 to be cleaned (i.e., a dirty wafer) or other substances (e.g., chemical cleaning solution in the wafer cleaning unit 20) that may contaminate the wafer 200, the first robot 30 needs to be cleaned and dried by the hand washing unit 50; if the first robot 30 does not touch the wafer 200 to be cleaned (i.e., a dirty wafer) or other substances that may contaminate the wafer 200 (e.g., chemical cleaning solution in the wafer cleaning unit 20), but touches substances that may affect the drying effect of the wafer 200 (e.g., pure water in the wafer cleaning unit 20), the first robot 30 needs to first dry by the hand washing unit 50, and then cleaning may not be performed.

As shown in fig. 3-7, in some embodiments, hand washing unit 50 includes a hand washing chamber 51 and a spray hand washing structure 52 disposed within hand washing chamber 51, spray hand washing structure 52 including a purge structure 521 for spraying gas onto first robot arm 30 (or second robot arm 40) and a spray structure 522 for spraying liquid onto first robot arm 30 (or second robot arm 40). The liquid sprayed by the spraying structure 522 can wash the first manipulator 30 (or the second manipulator 40), and the gas sprayed by the purging structure 521 can dry the first manipulator 30 (or the second manipulator 40). Wafer staging structure 60 is disposed within hand washing chamber 51. Further, the wafer temporary storage structure 60 includes a placing part 61 and a driving part 62, the placing part 61 is used for placing the wafer 200, and the driving part 62 is used for driving the placing part 61 to move up and down, so that the placing part 61 can move to the temporary storage position and the avoiding position in the vertical direction.

As shown in fig. 3 and 4, when the placing section 61 is in the temporary storage position, the top surface of the placing section 61 is higher than the spray hand washing structure 52, or the top surface of the placing section 61 is flush with the top surface of the spray hand washing structure 52, so that the placing section 61 can place the wafer 200 to be washed. The top surface of the placing part 61 is a carrying surface for placing the wafer 200, and since the wafer 200 is generally circular, after the wafer 200 is placed on the carrying surface, the distance (i.e., the height difference in the vertical direction) between the edge of the wafer 200 and the carrying surface is gradually increased from the center to both sides. Therefore, when the top surface of the placement portion 61 is higher than the spray hand washing structures 52 or flush with the top surface of the spray hand washing structures 52, the edges of the wafers 200 will not necessarily contact the spray hand washing structures 52 after the wafers 200 to be cleaned are placed on the top surface of the placement portion 61, thereby preventing the wafers 200 placed on the placement portion 61 from interfering with the spray hand washing structures 52.

It should be noted that if the top surface (i.e., the bearing surface) of the placement section 61 is arc-shaped, when determining the positional relationship between the top surface of the placement section 61 and the spray hand washing structure 52 in the vertical direction, the lowest point of the top surface of the placement section 61 may be compared with the spray hand washing structure 52, the highest point of the top surface of the placement section 61 may be compared with the spray hand washing structure 52, and the center of the space surrounded by the top surface of the placement section 61 may be compared with the spray hand washing structure 52. In addition, it is understood that in other embodiments, it is also feasible if the top surface of the placing portion 61 is slightly lower than the top surface of the spray hand washing structure 52, at this time, the wafer 200 can be smoothly placed on the top surface of the placing portion 61, and there is no contact interference between the wafer 200 and the spray hand washing structure 52.

As shown in fig. 5 to 7, when the placing portion 61 is located at the avoiding position, the whole placing portion 61 is lower than the spray hand washing structure 52 to avoid the spray hand washing structure 52, so as to avoid the placing portion 61 from affecting the spraying work of the spray hand washing structure 52. It should be noted that, the height difference between the specific placement portion 61 and the spray hand washing structure 52 when the placement portion 61 is in the retracted position is not limited, and in principle, as long as it is ensured that the placement portion 61 is entirely located below the entire spray hand washing structure 52 at this time, the placement portion 61 can be prevented from affecting the spraying work of the spray hand washing structure 52.

When a certain wafer 200 needs to be stored on the temporary wafer storage structure 60, the driving unit 62 is controlled to drive the placing unit 61 to ascend to the temporary storage position, and then the wafer 200 is placed on the placing unit 61; when no wafer 200 is placed on the placing section 61 and the first robot 30 (or the second robot 40) needs to be cleaned by the hand washing unit 50, the control driving section 62 drives the placing section 61 to descend to the escape position, and then the hand washing function of the hand washing unit 50 is started. Therefore, the liftable placing part 61 of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 realizes the temporary storage function of the wafer 200 without affecting the hand washing function of the hand washing unit 50.

It should be noted that the placing part 61 of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is not limited to be liftable, and in some embodiments not shown in the drawings, the placing part 61 of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 may be always fixedly disposed in the hand washing chamber 51, and at this time, the specific size and position of the hand washing structures such as the placing part 61 and the spray type hand washing structure 52 in the hand washing chamber 51 need to be designed reasonably, so that the placing part 61 on which the wafer 200 is not placed does not contact and interfere with the first manipulator 30 (or the second manipulator 40) for washing hands.

Further, as shown in fig. 3-7, in some embodiments, two of the spray hand washing structures 52 are spaced apart in the horizontal direction, and in each of the spray hand washing structures 52, the purge structure 521 and the spray structure 522 are spaced apart in the vertical direction. Preferably, the purge structure 521 is located above the spray structure 522. In each of the hand washing spray structures 52, the blowing structure 521 includes a pair of blowing nozzles spaced apart from each other, and the blowing directions of the pair of blowing nozzles are opposite to each other; the spray structure 522 includes a pair of spray nozzles disposed at intervals, and the spray directions of the liquid (for example, pure water, an aqueous solution to which a cleaning agent is added, and the like) of the pair of spray nozzles are opposite; a pair of purge nozzles are vertically aligned with a pair of spray nozzles and together define a spray area of the spray hand washing structure 52.

Taking the first robot 30 as an example, the first robot 30 includes two first clamping portions 31 spaced apart from each other, each of the first clamping portions 31 has a first wafer-clamping end 311, and the opening between the two first clamping portions 31 is adjustable so that the two first wafer-clamping ends 311 can selectively clamp or release the wafer 200. The two first clamping portions 31 of the first manipulator 30 can penetrate into the spraying areas of the two spraying hand washing structures 52 respectively, so that the two first clamping portions 31 are sprayed and cleaned by the spraying structures 522 of the two spraying hand washing structures 52 respectively, and/or the two first clamping portions 31 are dried by the blowing structures 521 of the two spraying hand washing structures 52 respectively. It is understood that the second robot arm 40 includes two second clamping portions spaced apart from each other, each of the second clamping portions having a second wafer clamping end, and an opening degree between the two second clamping portions is adjustable to enable the two second wafer clamping ends to selectively clamp or release the wafer 200. Accordingly, when hand washing unit 50 is used to wash second robot 40, the two second clamping portions of second robot 40 can penetrate into the spraying areas of the two spray hand washing structures 52, respectively, to spray wash the two second clamping portions with the two spray hand washing structures 52, respectively.

As shown in fig. 4 and 5, the placing part 61 of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is lifted and lowered in the corresponding vertical space between the two sprinkling hand washing structures 52. A first space formed between the two spray hand washing structures 52 and a second space in the hand washing chamber 51 below the first space together form a "vertical space". In other words, the movement path of the placing part 61 when ascending and descending passes through the first space between the two hand washing spray structures 52. The arrangement of the temporary wafer storage structure 60 can reduce the space occupied by the temporary wafer storage structure 60, and avoid the over-large volume of the hand washing unit 50. The space occupied by the temporary wafer storage structure 60 includes an installation space where the temporary wafer storage structure 60 fixes the components and a moving space where the movable components such as the placing unit 61 are moved. Alternatively, it is also contemplated that wafer staging structure 60 may be added directly to the original hand washing unit 50, without changing the original structure of hand washing unit 50, and may be more advantageous for installation and placement.

In particular, as shown in fig. 3-7, in some embodiments hand washing unit 50 further includes a hand washing basin 53, hand washing basin 53 being disposed within hand washing chamber 51 and beneath spray hand washing structure 52. The hand washing tank 53 contains liquid (for example, pure water, an aqueous solution added with a cleaning agent, and the like), and when the first wafer clamping end 311 of the first clamping part 31 of the first manipulator 30 (or the second wafer clamping end 311 of the second clamping part of the second manipulator 40) extends into the hand washing tank 53, the hand washing tank 53 can be cleaned by overflowing the liquid in the hand washing tank 53.

As shown in fig. 6 and 7, when the placing portion 61 is in the retracted position, the placing portion 61 is lower than the top surface of the hand washing tub 53. Since the spray cleaning operation of the spray type hand washing structure 52 is performed above the hand washing tank 53 and the overflow cleaning operation of the hand washing tank 53 is performed inside the hand washing tank, it is inevitable that the placing section 61 does not have any influence on the cleaning operation of the hand washing unit 50 at this time as long as the placing section 61 is lower than the top surface of the hand washing tank 53.

The specific configuration of the driving unit 62 is not limited, and any configuration may be used as long as the driving unit 61 can be driven to move up and down. For example, as shown in fig. 3 to 7, in some embodiments, the driving part 62 includes a mounting seat 621, a guide 622, a slider 623, a support 624, and a driving source (not shown in the drawings). The mounting block 621 is fixedly provided on the wall of the hand washing chamber 51. The guide 622 is fixedly disposed on the mounting seat 621. The slider 623 is movably disposed on the guide 622 in the vertical direction. The support 624 is connected between the placing portion 61 and the slider 623, and the support 624 is extended in the vertical direction. The driving source is drivingly connected to the slider 623 and/or the support 624 to drive the slider 623, the support 624, and the placing section 61 to move in the vertical direction.

Among them, the support member 624 plays a role of supporting the placing section 61, and due to the provision of the support member 624, the mounting seat 621, the guide member 622, the slider 623 and the driving source can be mounted to a slightly lower position in the hand washing chamber 51, thereby preventing these structures from interfering with the spray type hand washing structure 52 and the hand washing sink 53, and facilitating the arrangement. The guide 622 can guide the slider 623, the support 624, and the placing section 61 during movement, thereby preventing the placing section 61 from being positionally displaced during lifting.

Preferably, the guide 622 is plural, the plural guides 622 are arranged at intervals in the horizontal direction, and the slider 623 is movably arranged on the plural guides 622 at the same time. That is, the sliding member 623 moves along the plurality of guides 622 simultaneously, and the sliding member 623 is mounted on the plurality of guides 622 simultaneously, so that the guiding effect can be further ensured, and in addition, the plurality of guides 622 can also support the sliding member 623, the support member 624, and the placement portion 61 better, and the placement portion 61 can move more smoothly. In the embodiment shown in fig. 3 to 7, there are two guiding elements 622, and the two guiding elements 622 are symmetrically disposed with respect to the supporting element 624, so that it can be ensured that the supporting force provided by the two guiding elements 622 to the sliding element 623, the supporting element 624 and the placing portion 61 is distributed more uniformly, which is beneficial to ensuring the moving smoothness of the placing portion 61, and in addition, the symmetrical structure is also more convenient for installation and arrangement.

It is to be understood that the specific structures and mounting manners of the mounting seat 621, the guide 622, and the slider 623 are not limited as long as the slider 623 can move on the guide 622 in the vertical direction. In the embodiment shown in fig. 3-7, mounting block 621 is a mounting plate mounted on the side walls of hand washing compartment 51, two guides 622 are two rails mounted on the plate surface of the mounting plate, each rail extending in a vertical direction, and slider 623 is a slider movably mounted on both rails. In addition, it should be noted that the specific type of the driving source is not limited, and may be any device capable of providing a driving force, for example, the driving source may be a driving motor, a driving cylinder, a driving hydraulic cylinder, or the like.

Fig. 3 is a schematic view showing a state in which hand washing unit 50 and wafer temporary storage structure 60 temporarily store wafers 200, in which placement section 61 of wafer temporary storage structure 60 is in the temporary storage position and wafers 200 are placed on placement section 61; fig. 4 is a schematic view showing the hand washing unit 50 and wafer staging structure 60 in a state where the first robot arm 30 grips the staged wafer 200; fig. 5 is a schematic view showing the hand washing unit 50 and the wafer temporary storage structure 60 in a state where the first robot arm 30 grips the temporarily stored wafer 200 and the placing section 61 is lowered to the escape position, in which the placing section 61 is detached from the wafer 200; fig. 6 is a schematic view of hand washing unit 50 and wafer staging structure 60 after the staged wafer 200 has been removed by first robot 30; fig. 7 is a schematic view showing the hand washing unit 50 and the wafer escrow structure 60 in a state where the placing section 61 is in the retracted position and the hand washing unit 50 washes the first robot arm 30. It should be noted that fig. 3 to 7 show an example of the process of cleaning the first robot 30 by the hand washing unit 50 after the wafers 200 are removed from the wafer temporary storage structure 60, and in practice, the sequence of the removal of the wafers 200 by the first robot 30 and the lowering of the placing section 61 is not limited to this, and may be performed simultaneously, or the wafers 200 are removed by the first robot 30 and then the placing section 61 is lowered to the avoiding position.

As shown in fig. 3 and 4, in some embodiments, the placing portion 61 includes a plurality of supporting plates 611 spaced apart from each other in the horizontal direction, and each of the supporting plates 611 has an arc-shaped supporting slot (not shown) at the top thereof, and the arc-shaped supporting slot is configured to match with an edge of the wafer 200, and the wafer 200 is supported by the plurality of arc-shaped supporting slots on the plurality of supporting plates 611. Wherein, a plurality of bearing support plates 611 are jointly connected and installed on the bottom plate 612, and the bottom plate 612 is connected with the supporting piece 624, and the structure can effectively reduce the weight of the placing part 61. In addition, the arc-shaped bearing grooves on the plurality of bearing support plates 611 are located on the same circumference, and the circumference is adapted to the shape of the edge of the wafer 200, so that the contact area between the edge of the wafer 200 and each arc-shaped bearing groove is ensured to be the largest, and the bearing stability is ensured. Of course, the specific structure of the placing part 61 is not limited thereto, and in other embodiments not shown in the drawings, the placing part 61 may be any structure capable of carrying the wafer 200. The number of wafers 200 that can be placed on the placing unit 61 at one time is not limited, but is preferably one, and may be two or more, as needed in actual circumstances.

As shown in fig. 2, in some embodiments, the wafer cleaning unit 20 includes a plurality of cleaning sub-units, the plurality of cleaning sub-units are sequentially and adjacently arranged along a horizontal direction, and the wafer cleaning unit 20, the hand washing unit 50, the drying unit 70, and the loading and unloading unit 10 are sequentially and adjacently arranged along the horizontal direction (i.e., the arrangement direction of the plurality of cleaning sub-units). The first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are movable in the horizontal direction (i.e., the direction in which the plurality of washing subunits are arranged). That is, the plurality of cleaning sub-units, the wafer cleaning unit 20, the hand washing unit 50, the drying unit 70, and the loading and unloading unit 10 are arranged substantially along a line along which the first robot arm 30 and the second robot arm 40 move, which further facilitates the dispatching of the first robot arm 30 and the second robot arm 40.

Of course, it is understood that in other embodiments not shown in the drawings, the plurality of cleaning sub-units, the wafer cleaning unit 20, the hand washing unit 50, the drying unit 70, and the loading and unloading unit 10 may not be arranged along the same straight line, and the positional relationship between the units may be designed according to the actual requirement.

Further, as shown in FIG. 2Each cleaning subunit comprises a chemical liquid tank and a water tank, and the distance between the water tank and the hand washing unit 50 in each cleaning subunit is smaller than the distance between the chemical liquid tank and the hand washing unit 50. That is, the sink in each cleaning sub-unit is closer to hand wash unit 50 than the chemical sink. For example, in the particular embodiment shown in fig. 2, wafer cleaning unit 20 includes 4

cleaning sub-units

21a, 21b, 21c, 21d, cleaning sub-unit 21a includes chemical bath 211a and water tank 212a, cleaning sub-unit 21b includes chemical bath 211b and water tank 212b, cleaning sub-unit 21c includes chemical bath 211c and water tank 212c, and cleaning sub-unit 21d includes chemical bath 211d and water tank 212 d. Wherein the chemical tank contains chemical cleaning solution containing H₂SO₄、HCL、NH₄OH、H₂O₂Solutions of components such as HF are roughly classified into acidic cleaning solutions and alkaline cleaning solutions. The water tank generally holds pure water.

After the wafer 200 to be cleaned enters the wafer cleaning unit 20, the wafer 200 is cleaned in at least one cleaning subunit according to a specific cleaning scheme, and at this time, the wafer 200 to be cleaned is generally put into a chemical liquid tank for chemical cleaning, and after the chemical cleaning, the wafer 200 is put into the water tank for water cleaning. The final step in cleaning the wafer 200 in the wafer cleaning unit 20 is to perform an overflow rinse in the water tank of one of the cleaning sub-units, and the wafer 200 after rinsing may be considered to be cleaned, and at this time, the wafer 200 needs to be taken out by the first robot 30 after cleaning in the hand washing unit 50, so that the above operation can be facilitated by disposing the water tank of the cleaning sub-unit close to the hand washing unit 50.

In the above semiconductor cleaning apparatus, the basic transfer flow of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 for cleaning of one wafer 200 is roughly as follows:

the first robot 30 transfers the wafer 200 to be cleaned from the loading and unloading unit 10 to the wafer temporary storage structure 60 inside the hand washing unit 50, and at this time, the placing part 61 of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is lifted to the temporary storage position to temporarily store the wafer 200 to be cleaned (as shown in fig. 3). The second robot 40 moves to the wafer temporary storage structure 60 and transfers the wafer 200 to be cleaned temporarily stored therein to a certain cleaning sub-unit for chemical cleaning and water washing. During the cleaning process of the wafer 200 in the wafer cleaning unit 20, the second robot arm 40 is further used for switching and transferring the wafer 200 among the plurality of cleaning sub-units according to a specific cleaning scheme, and when the cleaning is about to be completed (i.e. the last step of cleaning is reached), the second robot arm 40 transfers the wafer 200 into the water tank 212d of the cleaning sub-unit 21d next to the hand washing unit 50 for overflow rinsing before the drying process. At the same time, the wafer 200 to be cleaned is no longer placed on the wafer temporary storage structure 60, and the placing section 61 of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 is lowered to the escape position (as shown in fig. 6). The first robot 30 will at least perform cleaning within the hand washing unit 50. After the cleaning is completed, the first robot 30 moves to the water tank 212d to take out the cleaned wafer 200, and transfers the wafer 200 to the drying unit 70 for drying. Thereafter, the first robot 30 may at least dry in the hand washing unit 50. After the drying is completed, the first robot 30 after drying conveys the dried wafer 200 from the drying unit 70 to the loading and unloading unit 10 for unloading.

It should be noted that depending on the cleaning recipe of the wafer 200 to be cleaned, which of the plurality of cleaning subunits the cleaning is performed in or in which order may be selected, the second robot arm 40 is responsible for switching the transfer of the wafer 200 between the plurality of cleaning subunits. If the chemical tanks of two cleaning sub-units are filled with acidic cleaning solution and alkaline cleaning solution, respectively, and the wafer 200 needs to be switched between the two cleaning sub-units, the second robot 40 also needs to enter the hand washing unit 50 for washing hands before switching to prevent the cleaning solutions from being contaminated.

The above-mentioned exemplary transfer flows of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are basic transfer flows for cleaning one wafer 200, and in order to meet the requirement of a high-throughput process in practical application of the apparatus, the apparatus needs to perform a cleaning operation on a plurality of wafers 200 at the same time, that is, a plurality of the above-mentioned basic transfer flows of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are performed in a crossed manner in the same time period. At this time, as can be seen from the foregoing analysis, based on the fact that the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are respectively responsible for the transferring operation of the wafer 200 and the temporary storage function of the wafer temporary storage structure 60 for the wafer 200, the scheduling schemes of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 are reasonably designed according to the sequence of the wafer 200 entering each process unit, the process duration of each process unit, and other factors, so that the situation that the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100 completely stops the transferring operation for the wafer 200, that is, the situation that the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 stay and wait at the same time, can be reduced or avoided as much as possible, ideally, during the operation of the semiconductor cleaning apparatus 100, at least one of the first robot 30 and the second robot 40 is in the transferring state for the wafer 200, thereby greatly improving the transferring efficiency of the wafer 200, the productivity of the equipment is improved, and the requirement of a high-yield process is further met.

It will be understood that the above embodiments are merely exemplary embodiments taken to illustrate the principles of the present invention, which is not limited thereto. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and improvements can be made without departing from the spirit and substance of the utility model, and these modifications and improvements are also considered to be within the scope of the utility model.

Claims

1. A semiconductor cleaning apparatus for cleaning a wafer, comprising:

the wafer cleaning unit is used for cleaning the wafer to be cleaned, the drying unit is used for drying the cleaned wafer, and the loading and unloading unit is used for loading the wafer to be cleaned and unloading the dried wafer;

a first manipulator, a second manipulator, and a hand washing unit, wherein,

the hand washing unit is used for washing and/or drying the first manipulator, a wafer temporary storage structure is arranged in the hand washing unit and used for temporarily storing the wafer to be washed,

the first manipulator is used for conveying the wafer to be cleaned to the wafer temporary storage structure from the loading and unloading unit, conveying the cleaned wafer to the drying unit from the wafer cleaning unit after being cleaned by the hand washing unit, and conveying the dried wafer to the loading and unloading unit from the drying unit after being dried by the hand washing unit,

the second mechanical arm is used for conveying the wafer to be cleaned to the wafer cleaning unit from the wafer temporary storage structure.

2. The semiconductor cleaning apparatus of claim 1,

the hand washing unit comprises a hand washing cavity and a spraying type hand washing structure arranged in the hand washing cavity, the spraying type hand washing structure comprises a blowing structure and a spraying structure, the blowing structure is used for spraying gas, the spraying structure is used for spraying liquid,

the temporary wafer storage structure is arranged in the hand washing chamber and comprises a placing part and a driving part, the driving part is used for driving the placing part to lift so as to enable the placing part to move to a temporary storage position and an avoiding position in the vertical direction, wherein,

when the placing part is located at the temporary storage position, the top surface of the placing part is higher than the spraying type hand washing structure, or the top surface of the placing part is flush with the top surface of the spraying type hand washing structure, so that the wafer to be cleaned can be placed on the placing part;

when the placing part is located at the avoiding position, the placing part is lower than the spraying type hand washing structure so as to avoid the spraying type hand washing structure.

3. The semiconductor cleaning device according to claim 2, wherein the number of the spray type hand washing structures is two, the two spray type hand washing structures are arranged at intervals in the horizontal direction, in each spray type hand washing structure, the purging structure and the spraying structure are arranged at intervals in the vertical direction, the first manipulator comprises two first clamping portions which are arranged at intervals and adjustable in opening degree, the spraying structures of the two spray type hand washing structures are respectively used for spraying and cleaning the two first clamping portions, the purging structures of the two spray type hand washing structures are respectively used for drying the two first clamping portions, and the placing portion is lifted in a corresponding vertical space between the two spray type hand washing structures.

4. The semiconductor cleaning device according to claim 3, wherein the hand washing unit further comprises a hand washing tank, the hand washing tank is arranged in the hand washing chamber and located below the spray type hand washing structure, the first wafer clamping end of the first clamping portion extends into the hand washing tank for cleaning, and when the placing portion is located at the avoiding position, the placing portion is lower than the top surface of the hand washing tank.

5. The semiconductor cleaning apparatus according to any one of claims 2 to 4, wherein the driving portion includes:

the mounting seat is fixedly arranged on the wall of the hand washing chamber;

the guide piece is fixedly arranged on the mounting seat, and the sliding piece is movably arranged on the guide piece along the vertical direction;

a support member connected between the placing portion and the slider, the support member being provided to extend in a vertical direction;

a driving source drivingly connected to the slider and/or the support to drive the slider, the support, and the placement section to move in a vertical direction.

6. The semiconductor cleaning apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the guide member is plural, plural guide members are provided at intervals in the horizontal direction, and the slide member is movably provided on the plural guide members.

7. The semiconductor cleaning apparatus according to claim 6, wherein the number of the guide members is two, and the two guide members are symmetrically disposed with respect to the support member.

8. The semiconductor cleaning device according to claim 2, wherein the placing part comprises a plurality of supporting plates arranged at intervals in the horizontal direction, each supporting plate is provided with an arc-shaped supporting groove at the top, the arc-shaped supporting grooves are used for matching with the edge of the wafer, and the arc-shaped supporting grooves on the plurality of supporting plates are positioned on the same circumference.

9. The semiconductor cleaning apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the wafer cleaning unit comprises a plurality of cleaning sub-units, the cleaning sub-units are sequentially arranged adjacent to each other in a horizontal direction, and the wafer cleaning unit, the hand washing unit, the drying unit, and the loading and unloading unit are sequentially arranged adjacent to each other in the horizontal direction, and the first robot arm and the second robot arm are movable in the horizontal direction.

10. The semiconductor cleaning apparatus of claim 9, wherein each cleaning sub-unit includes a chemical tank and a water tank, and a distance between the water tank and the hand washing unit is smaller than a distance between the chemical tank and the hand washing unit.