111results about How to "Maximize signal to noise ratio" patented technology

To locate / size contaminants at the surface of a dielectric or semiconductor material, a P-polarized beam of light from a monochromatic solid-state source is disposed specifically at Brewster's angle and focused to form an illuminated quasi-elliptical spot on the surface that produces effectively no reflected or scattered light from the surface. The spot is scanned over the entire surface so as to assure multiple passes of any contaminant through the spot. On each pass through the spot a contaminant will produce scattered light. A novel high numerical aperture reflective or refractive system is disposed above the surface to always view the spot and to collect / redirect the bulk of the contaminant scattered light to a detector. Illumination at Brewster's angle combined with the high numerical aperture scattered light collector / redirector maximizes the signal-to-noise ratio from the detector. These core components are packaged with support subsystems as a uniquely compact and portable apparatus.

Systems and methods for inspecting a wafer are provided. One system includes an illumination subsystem configured to illuminate the wafer; a collection subsystem configured to collect light scattered from the wafer and to preserve the polarization of the scattered light; an optical element configured to separate the scattered light collected in different segments of the collection numerical aperture of the collection subsystem, where the optical element is positioned at a Fourier plane or a conjugate of the Fourier plane of the collection subsystem; a polarizing element configured to separate the scattered light in one of the different segments into different portions of the scattered light based on polarization; and a detector configured to detect one of the different portions of the scattered light and to generate output responsive to the detected light, which is used to detect defects on the wafer.

A system for sorting articles includes a detector system having a plurality of narrow bandwidth sources of electromagnetic energy sequentially illuminating articles passing through the detector system, the detector system further including a collector for collecting electromagnetic energy reflected from the articles; a deflector for deflecting selected articles toward an alternative destination; and a control system, operably connected to the collector and the deflector, for actuating the deflector in response to a sensed parameter of the electromagnetic energy collected in the collector.

An interference-canceling receiver processes coded, multiple-access, spread-spectrum transmissions that propagate through frequency-selective communication channels from multiple transmit antennas to multiple receive antennas in a closed-loop transmit-diversity channel. The receiver provides for repeated use of symbol-estimate weighting, subtractive cancellation with a stabilizing step-size, and mixed-decision symbol estimation. Receivers may be designed, adapted, and implemented explicitly in software or programmed hardware, or implicitly in standard Rake-based hardware, either within a Rake receiver at the finger level or outside the Rake at the user or subchannel symbol level. The receiver may be employed in user equipment on the forward link or in a base station on the reverse link.