US Patent 8419341 Linear vacuum robot with Z motion and articulated arm

There is described apparatus and methods for transporting and processing substrates including wafers as to efficiently produce at reasonable costs improved throughput as compared to systems in use today. A linear transport chamber includes linear tracks and robot arms riding on the linear tracks to linearly transfer substrates along the sides of processing chambers for feeding substrates into a controlled atmosphere through a load lock and then along a transport chamber as a way of reaching processing chambers. A four-axis robot arm is disclosed, capable of linear translation, rotation and articulation, and z-motion.