DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
This office action is responsive to the application N° 19/042,393 filed on January 31, 2025 in which claims 1-27 are pending and ready for examination.
Information Disclosure Statement
Acknowledgment is made of Applicant’s Information Disclosure Statement (IDS), form PTOQ-1449 is attached to this Office Action. These IDS have been considered.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of papers submitted under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d), which papers have been placed of record in the file.
Drawings
The examiner contends that the drawings submitted on January 31, 2025 are acceptable for examination proceedings.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1-5, 7-14, 16-23 and 25-27 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakagawa et al. [US 5859707 A, hereafter Nakagawa] in view of Hoschke et al. [US 20200223221 A1, hereafter Hoschke].
As per Claims 1, 10 and 19, Nakagawa teaches a method to align a substrate for lithography (Column 3 lines 3-7), the method comprising:
receiving an image of the substrate including a fiducial pattern with a plurality of fiducial markings (Column 3 lines 25-37);
applying a model matching technique to match respective fiducial markings of the plurality of fiducial markings based on a model fiducial marking (wherein the apparatus also comprises a first fiducial (reference) body situated between the detected object and the condenser optical system); and
transmitting instructions for aligning the substrate based on a location of the identified fiducial pattern (Column 3 lines 45-49).
Nakagawa does not explicitly teach applying a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings to identify the fiducial pattern.
Hoschke teaches imaging the fiducials at a first resolution to generate imaged fiducials; cross-correlating a template fiducial with the imaged fiducials at a plurality of different displacements relative to each imaged fiducial, the template fiducial having a configuration matching the imaged fiducials; determining a two-dimensional set of cross-correlation values for each imaged fiducial, each set of cross-correlation values indicating a center of a respective fiducial; and generating alignment data for the printhead using the sets of cross-correlation values (Para 16-19).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
As per Claims 2, 11 and 20, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 1.
Hoschke further teaches wherein applying the model matching technique includes: measuring a cross-correlation between pixel values in the image and the model fiducial marking at respective displacements; and normalizing the cross-correlation by a standard deviation of the pixel values (Para 18-19).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
As per Claims 3, 12 and 21, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 1.
Hoschke further teaches wherein the shaping technique includes a median circle fit algorithm (Para 25).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
As per Claims 4, 13 and 22, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 3.
Hoschke further teaches wherein the median circle fit algorithm includes: determining a plurality of radius values of the fiducial pattern based on at least one subset of fiducial markings; determining a standard deviation of the plurality of radius values; and removing at least one outlier value of the matched fiducial markings based on the standard deviation of the plurality of radius values (Para 25).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
As per Claims 5, 14 and 23, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 1.
Nakagawa further disclosed aligning the substrate based on the instructions, wherein the instructions include alignment correction information; and projecting at least one image on the substrate based on the alignment correction information (Column 3 lines 45-49).
As per Claims 7, 16 and 25, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 1.
Hoschke further teaches wherein the model fiducial marking is a template, and wherein applying the model matching technique includes: matching a respective fiducial marking with the template; determining an initial center position of the respective fiducial marking based on the matching; refining the initial center position of the respective fiducial marking based on gradient values to determine a refined center position (Para 17).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
As per Claims 8, 17 and 26, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 7.
Hoschke further teaches wherein refining the initial center position includes: applying a median filter to the image; determining gradient values for pixels in the image; applying a correlation technique for matching gradient values with a nominal shape of the fiducial marking; and determining the refined center position based on the correlation technique (Para 59-61).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
As per Claims 9, 18 and 27, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 1.
Hoschke further teaches retrieving a template design of the fiducial pattern; comparing fiducial pattern in image to template design; determining variance information of alignment features of fiducial pattern based on comparing fiducial pattern in image to template design; generating a key metric based on the variance information, wherein the key metric is a visualization of X, Y position, CD variation, hole roundness and correlation coefficient to the template design of the fiducial pattern (Para 53).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a shaping technique to the matched fiducial markings in order to improve alignment accuracy.
Claim(s) 6, 15 and 24 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakagawa in view of Hoschke as applied above, in further view of Kohler et al. [US 20050190959 A1, hereafter Kohler].
As per Claims 6, 15 and 24, Nakagawa in view of Hoschke teaches the method of claim 1.
Nakagawa in view of Hoschke does not explicitly teach wherein the fiducial pattern with the plurality of fiducial markings includes a plurality of laser drilled holes arranged in a circular pattern.
Kohler teaches using the CAD/CAM data, the positions of drill holes specified by the CAD/CAM data, also referred to herein as the specified hole positions, are identified, as indicated in Block 43. CAD/CAM data is then used to generate parameters for each specified drill hole that are then used to determine the acceptability of the drilled hole. Specifically, for each specified drill hole location, a region of the PCB surface, also referred to herein as a region of interest R, and measure of an error threshold is determined (Para 40).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at time the invention was made to incorporate a laser drilled holes as claimed in order to locate exact position of the mark.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MESFIN ASFAW whose telephone number is (571)270-5247. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 8 am - 4 pm.
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/MESFIN T ASFAW/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2882
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