METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DETERMINING LINE CHARACTERISTICS, E.G., LINE ROUGHNESS, OF MICROFEATURE COMPONENTS

摘要

The present invention provides a method of analyzing a periodic microfeature structure carried by a substrate. According to this method, polarized radiation is directed at the structure. The radiation has a plane of incidence that is generally perpendicular to an orientation of the structure. Radiation reflected by the structure is filtered with a polarized filter. An intensity of the filtered radiation is detected and the detected intensity is correlated to a line characteristic of the structure, e.g., line roughness.