Reticle haze measurement by spectroscopic ellipsometry

This paper introduces the haze measurement method by using the spectroscopic ellipsometry. The quantity of the haze including the roughness of the reticle can be accurately measured by the spectroscopic ellipsometry. The haze inspecting method by this ellipsometric measurement does not give any damage to the sample, and it is not necessary to cover conductive material unlike to SEM, and it can get very small haze thickness difference by 0.2 ∼ 0.3 nm. One of the other merits of HIME is that the actual inspection time is only a few second. We can also obtain the mask roughness map as a function of dose. More details and applications of haze measuring process are presented and discussed.