Elman Neural Network–Based Dynamic Scheduling of Wafer Photolithography Process

Photolithography area is usually a bottleneck area in a semiconductor wafer manufacturing system (SWMS). It is difficult to schedule photolithography area on real-time optimally. Here, an Elman neural network (ENN)-based dynamic scheduling method is proposed. An ENN-based sample learning algorithm is proposed for selecting best combination of scheduling rules. To illustrate the feasibility and practicality of the presented method, the simulation experiment is developed. A numerical example is use to evaluate the proposed method. Results of simulation experiments show that the proposed method is effective to schedule a complex wafer photolithography process.