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Abstract

The present invention provides a method and apparatus of using optical temperature measurement as an in-situ monitoring of etch rate. First of all, a plasma etching process is performed in a plasma etcher having a vacuum chamber. Then, an optical multi-channel analyzer (OMA) monitors a series of emission lines of a certain plasma species emitted from the vacuum chamber during the plasma etching process. Then, based on the intensity distribution of the emission lines detected, a computer computes and generates an optical temperature. Finally, the computer generates a relevant ER based on the optical temperature. The emission lines are emitted due to the transitions between different energy states of a certain plasma species. These transitions may be between different electronic energy states, vibrational energy states, or rotational energy states, whereas the plasma species may be any one of the reactants in the plasma chamber such as CO, CO.sub.2, CF, CF.sub.2, SiF, C.sub.2, HF, etc.

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First Claim