Substrate processing apparatus and substrate processing method for successively processing a plurality of substrates

Abstract

One of reverse passing parts provided in a substrate passing part comprises a first holding mechanism and a second holding mechanism. The first holding mechanism and the second holding mechanism are arranged in vertically symmetry with respect to a rotary central axis and rotate 180 degrees about the rotary central axis, to replace each other in position. A transport robot on the loading side passes a substrate to a third holding mechanism or a fourth holding mechanism at a first vertical position. The substrate reversed in the reverse passing part is passed to a transport robot on the unloading side from the third holding mechanism or the fourth holding mechanism at a second vertical position. Before a reverse process on the preceding substrate is finished, the transport robot on the loading side can start the transfer of the following substrate.

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0001]1. Field of the Invention[0002]The present invention relates to a substrate processing apparatus and a substrate processing method for successively processing a plurality of substrates, such as semiconductor substrates, glass substrates for liquid crystal display devices, glass substrates for photomasks, substrates for optical disks or the like.[0003]2. Description of the Background Art[0004]As well known, products such as semiconductors, liquid crystal displays or the like are manufactured by performing a series of processings including cleaning, resist coating, exposure, development, etching, formation of interlayer insulating films, thermal processing, dicing and the like on the above substrates. Generally, a substrate processing apparatus consists of processing units for performing these processings and transport robots for transporting the substrates to the processing units. For example, an apparatus consisting of a coating unit for performing a...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0023]Since the transport robot can start transfer of the following processed substrate before a reverse process on the preceding processed substrate is finished, it is possible to reduce the standby time of the transport robot to a minimum while minimizing the number of reverse passing parts.

[0024]Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to reduce a standby time of a robot to a minimum while minimizing the number of reverse passing parts.

Problems solved by technology

In the substrate processing apparatus having such a cell structure as discussed above, if the number of process steps performed in each cell becomes larger, the number of transporting processes using the transport robot increases and the transport becomes a rate-limiting factor.

There arises a new problem, however, that if the substrate passing part performs some sort of substrate processing, the transport robot can not load the next substrate into the substrate passing part, in other words, a transport operation for the next substrate can not be started until the substrate processing is finished.

The simplest method to solve this problem is to increase the number of passing parts each of which also performs some sort of substrate processing, but since the reverse passing part which is a passing part for reversing front and back sides of a substrate has a large size, it is not easy to increase the number of stages for the passing parts for reasons of layout of the whole apparatus.

If the vertical-direction operating range of either one of the transport robots which access the substrate passing part is limited, especially, it is very hard to configure a multistage structure of the reverse passing parts for reversing front and back sides of substrates.

Images