Microelectronic Engineering 112 (2013) 163167

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Microelectronic Engineering
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/mee

Short Note

Automatic detection of NIL defects using microscopy and image processing

David Pietroy a, Issam Gereige b, Ccile Gourgon a,
a b

Laboratoire des Technologies de la Microlectronique (LTM), 17 rue des Martyrs (c/o CEA Grenoble), F-38 054 Grenoble Cedex 9, France Solar and Photovoltaics Engineering Research Center, 4700 King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia

a r t i c l e

i n f o

a b s t r a c t
Nanoimprint Lithography (NIL) is a promising technology for low cost and large scale nanostructure fabrication. This technique is based on a contact moldingdemolding process, that can produce number of defects such as incomplete lling, negative patterns, sticking. . . In this paper, microscopic imaging combined to a specic processing algorithm is used to detect numerically defects in printed patterns. Results obtained for 1D and 2D imprinted gratings with different microscopic image magnications are presented. Results are independent on the device which captures the image (optical, confocal or electron microscope). The use of numerical images allows the possibility to automate the detection and to compute a statistical analysis of defects. This method provides a fast analysis of printed gratings and could be used to monitor the production of such structures. 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Article history: Received 17 July 2012 Received in revised form 15 February 2013 Accepted 14 March 2013 Available online 29 March 2013 Keywords: Nanoimprint lithography Defects detection Image processing

1. Introduction Quality control is a very important step in industrial production. For years, human eye was the only sensor able to perform this complex action. But the development of new electronic technologies (CCD, computer science, image processing. . .) has led to the strong rise of machine vision and industrial image processing during the past decades. The main reason of the automation of the quality control is to speed up the industrial production and also to quantify the defects present in the nal product. Nowadays, this technique is widely used in industry, but each application requires a dedicated image processing. For example in [1], a real-time detection of defects is performed on steel bar in coil using a laplacian-based method. Ceramics is also a domain which nds an interest in machine vision for cracks detection using edge detection and morphological tools [2], and algorithms were improved to decrease the processing time and enlarge the detection to several kinds of defects [3]. But in the main part of applications, detection of defects consists in looking for macroscopic objects arranged on a homogeneous background. The problem becomes quite complex if the background is patterned which is the case in woven fabrics for example. In Ref. [4], this problem is solved by performing an optical Fourier ltering to suppress the background pattern and so come back to a trivial defects detection problem.
Corresponding author. Tel.: ++33 (0) 438789837; fax: +33 (0) 438785892.
E-mail address: cecile.gourgon@cea.fr (C. Gourgon). 0167-9317/$ - see front matter 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mee.2013.03.126

For micro/nano-structures, automatic defects detection has not been much studied. Most of the techniques that have been used are based on optical measurements combined to modeling [5]. The most signicant results are obtained using optical diffraction microscopic measurements and auxiliary sources model to solve the inverse problem [6], but the processing time is too long for an industrial application. Finally, the main work concerning image processing and defects detection on microstructures seems to be the enhancement of defects using Fresnel imaging [7], but this deals with a very particular case of twisted-nematic liquid crystal display. In this paper, we show the possible use of image processing to detect defects in the particular case of 1D and 2D periodic micro/nano-structures fabricated by nanoimprint lithography. This technique has been successfully used for sub-micron patterned structure fabrication over the last decade and is paving the way for large scale production at lower costs than conventional lithography. The drawback of this technique is induced by its principle. It has always been known that contact lithography is limited by defectivity. In NIL techniques, defects can be induced by an incomplete lling of the mold cavities, bubbles, sticking issues. . . It is therefore necessary to develop fast analysis of imprint process quality in order to control the reproducibility and to detect deviations in printed areas. This is already achievable using a combination of several heavy and expensive commercial tools as it is shown by the KLA-Tencor team in Ref. [8].

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The present work deals with the development of a simple methodology based on a light experimental setup and a complex image processing. This methodology permits the detection of defects in periodic structures. Demonstration is made by analyzing samples fabricated by Nano Imprint Lithography.

2. Principle To perform defects detection by optical microscopy, image processing is used. This is a low-cost and efcient part of computer science which also permits to compute a statistical analysis and so to quantify defects. The range of acceptance in a production line can then be characterized by a concrete criterion such as the percentage of defected area. In the case of nanopatterned structures, it is important to consider two kinds of defects: macroscopic and microscopic ones. In the rst case, a small magnication will be used for the imaging; therefore the patterning will be seen as a homogeneous background in the microscopic image. This case deals with a very classical problem of object detection in image processing. But in the second case, a large magnication is required for defects observation and patterns are visible on the image. Processing becomes more complex as patterns have to be erased before performing the defects detection. In this section we present the general principle of the image processing applied to defects detection in nanopatterned structures. To sum up, the problem deals with the detection of defects in a periodically nanopatterned sample. This sample is characterized using an imaging system (e.g. microscopy) and the acquired image can be numerically analyzed. Three elements compose this image: a background which can be induced by noise or non-homogeneous lightening, a periodic signal which represents the patterned structure, and a random signal which represents defects and which is the signal of interest in this study. Thus, both background and periodic signals have to be removed before performing a statistical analysis of defects. Background correction is a trivial problem in image processing but the removal of the periodical structures is more complex. The rst idea to solve this problem is to use Fourier ltering. Theoretically, subtracting the spectrum of the perfect periodic image to the spectrum of the real image should lead to a new image containing only defects without any deterioration of their sizes and shapes. But this is not so easy experimentally. Patterns are not perfect and their Fourier transform is not exactly equal to the one from a simplied geometrical prole. An alternative is to suppress the periodic peaks in the spectrum of the original image, these periodic peaks being directly induced by the periodicity of the signal following the Fourier-transform theory. The inconvenient of this method is that this removal can lead to a strong deterioration of the defects and also that a residual periodic signal always exists after such a ltering. Moreover, this kind of processing becomes more complex in the case of 2D-periodic structures. A second solution, which was used in this study, is based on mathematical morphology [9]. This method mainly consists in combinations of basic operations such dilation and erosion of an image by a structuring element. This structuring element is quite often of simple geometry (square, line, disk) which size is adjusted to obtain the desired effect on the original image. It is so possible to remove objects or holes from the foreground of an image using an opening (dilation of the erosion of an image using the same structuring element) or a closing (erosion of the dilation of an image using the same structuring element). These techniques are commonly used to suppress noise or objects, ll gaps or nd specic shapes in an image. In the present work, using mathematical morphology to erase periodic patterns is more intuitive, more adapted

to automation of defects detection, and also more easily congurable from a kind of periodic structures to another. The image processing consists in three steps. First, a post processing is performed. It aims at increasing the original image quality before processing. An opening of the original image is calculated with a large size element to determine the lightening map. This opened image is then subtracted from the original one to correct the background homogeneity. Finally the contrast is automatically adjusted to improve the image quality. If the grey level range of defects is close to the grey level of another kind of element in the image (pattern for example), detection can be difcult and strong morphological processing will be required to erase these elements. This operation will lead to a strong defects distortion and then false measurements. In this case, a specic contrast adjustment can be applied. Minimum and maximum grey levels of the defect image are dened and all the pixels out of the bounds of this range are set to zero. The contrast is then optimized to expand the grey level range of defects and minimize the grey level range of other elements in the image. The second step is a more complex image processing applied to the corrected image. This is the step that has to be adapted to each specic case, i-e each specic sample and defect which have to be characterized. The aim here is to convert the grey-scale corrected image in a binary image containing only the defects. Basically based on a thresholding, it can be combined with median ltering and morphological tools to erase the 1D and 2D patterns. These operations can result in a distortion of the defects and have to be carefully optimized. In most of the cases, erasing of the bright pat-

Fig. 1. Example of macroscopic defects detection on a grating observed with a small magnication: the grating is equivalent to a homogeneous background. (a) Original image, (b) corresponding defects image.

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tern is performed using an opening. The structuring element shape has to be chosen close to the geometry of the object to erase and its size as about half the object size. A median ltering with a few pixels size can be added to remove residual traces of the pattern on the nal defects image. Finally, the only parameter which has to be manually adjusted is the threshold for the binarization, but this operation remains very fast and simple. The last step consists in nding the connected pixels which form the different defects [10]. Each defect is labeled and the black-and-white image containing the defects is turned into a label image. From this last step, a statistical analysis of defects can be computed leading to the number of defects, the maximal and average defects size, and the percentage of defected area in the image. Defects are then presented in a histogram. This statistical analysis

permits to turn the label image into a defects image which displays all objects of a same bin with the same color. 3. Results In this section, we present results obtained for different kind of nano-structures imprinted on silicon wafers. First macroscopic defects are studied, implying a small magnication. This permits to detect defects such as cracks, stripes or dusts. Then two cases will be studied to demonstrate the microscopic defects detection on 1D and 2D gratings. The samples were made with the hot embossing process. The mold with 1D and 2D patterns is fabricated using standard microelectronic processes (optical lithography and reactive ion etching). This latter is chemically treated (hydrophobic) to avoid any sticking of the resist during the imprint. A thin lm of resist NEB22 (Sumitomo Chemical Inc.) is spun onto a Si substrate, heated up over the glass transition temperature. The mold and the substrate were pressed together for 10 min under vacuum at 40 kN. Before demolding, the system is cooled down to room temperature to solidify the resist. 3.1. Small magnication Fig. 1 shows an example of macroscopic defects detection. For small magnications, micro/nano structures are invisible and it appears like a uniform background. Object detection in such conditions is a well-known problem in image processing and solutions already exists. In our case, a simple background homogenization is followed by a simple thresholding to binarize the image before applying the object detection algorithm. The defects image is shown in Fig. 1b and the histogram of defects in Fig. 2. The statistical analysis of this image shows that there are 46 defects. The biggest defect is 150 pixels large and the average size is 100 pixels. The percentage of defected area is calculated to be 1%.

Fig. 2. Corresponding histogram of macroscopic defects detected on the 1D grating.

Fig. 3. Example of nanometric defects detection in 1D grating. (a) Original image, (b) defects image without specic pattern suppression algorithm, (c) corresponding histogram of defects and (d) defects image with line suppression.

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It is interesting to note in this example that sizes are measured using the basic image unity: the pixel. Thus the image processing principle is not depending on the image size range and it can be applied to the detection of any kind of defects in the macroscopic or microscopic range. The pixel size can then be converted into a real size using a scale bar embedded in the original image as it is shown in the examples hereunder. 3.2. 1D gratings Fig. 3 shows an example of microscopic defects in the case of a 1D grating. It deals with a line grating printed in a thermoplastic polymer by thermal NIL. It appears on the picture (a) of Fig. 3 that the mold has not been completely lled, and polymer is locally missing on the left edge of the lines, leading to holes. The development of corresponding NIL processes has been already presented in previous papers [11,12]. In this case, the classical algorithm used in Section 3.1 leads to the detection of both defects and patterns as shown in Fig. 3b. The difculty is to succeed in erasing the 8 pixels width lines without altering the defects properties. This is achieved combining an opening with a 4 pixels-linear element and a 1 pixel-median ltering. The level threshold is then adjusted. The resulting defects image is shown in Fig. 3c and the corresponding histogram of defects in Fig. 3d. The statistical analysis of this image shows that there are 102 defects in the analyzed eld. The biggest defect is 7 lm2 large and the average size is 2 lm2. The percentage of defected area is calculated to be 2% of the total surface. From a NIL point of view,

Fig. 5. Corresponding histogram of microscopic defects detected on the 2D grating.

this situation is representative of a NIL process performed under correct parameters, but which leads to few areas at the grating edges where local mold deformation impacts the lling [13]. 3.3. 2D gratings Fig. 4 shows an example of microscopic defects in the case of a 2D grating. Defects being dark, the grey image is rst inverted. As in the Section 3.2, the difculty is to succeed in erasing the 2D patterns consisting in disks with a 18 pixels width without altering the defects properties. This is achieved by combining an opening with a 9 pixels disk and a 1 pixel-median ltering. The level threshold is then adjusted. The resulting defects image is shown in Fig. 4b and the corresponding histogram of defects in Fig. 5. The statistical analysis of this image shows that there are 7 defects. The biggest defect is 14 lm2 large and the average size is 9 lm2. The percentage of defected area is calculated to be 0.6%. In this case it has to be noticed that it has been possible to detect only few defects, which where corresponding to a deformation of the patterns, and not to a lack of polymer or sticking problems. This demonstrates that the technique allows not only the characterization of external defects such as particles, but also the quantitative analysis of pattern deviation from expected proles. This image processing could be easily adapted and automated to characterize the reproducibility on production lines. 4. Conclusion We demonstrate the feasibility of extending image processing to the case of quality check of NIL nanostructures. Automated selection becomes directly possible on an industrial line. The main problem to detect microscopic defects, which is to erase the pattern image, was solved by combining morphological tools and linear ltering. Results give access to a statistical quantication of the defects on 1D and 2D gratings. One important point is that the image processing has to be adapted for each industrial case. This takes into account the type of structure, the type of defects, the dedicated application and the machine vision hardware (lighting source, microscope, camera, etc.). Acknowledgement

Fig. 4. Example of nanometric defects detection in dots arrays. (a) Original image, (b) defects image.

This work is supported by the NaPANIL european project.

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