PURPOSE: To reduce the adhesion of dust, etc. onto the surface of a thin plate and as well to reduce the cost of power consumption for air-purification around a device for transferring a thin plate such as, for example, a semiconductor wafer, etc., by laying means for heating the thin plate.

CONSTITUTION: Air from a compressor is fed into a pressure equalizing chamber 14, and then is blown out from an air blow-out port 18 onto a conveying surface for floating up a thin plate 24 from the conveying surface 32 so that the thin plate 24 is conveyed. In this case, an infrared ray heater 30 is laid in the upper section of the pressure equalizing chamber 14. Further, the conveying surface 32 is formed of a transparent glass material having a low infrared-ray absorption coefficient. Further, the thin plate 24 on the process of conveyance is heated by the heat radiation of the above-mentioned heater 30 so that the temperature of surface of the thin plate 24 is made higher than the atmosphere temperature therearound due to the heat transmission of the thin plate itself. With this arrangement, a space which contains no dust is formed in the close vicinity of the surface of the thin plate 2, thereby the adhesion of dust onto the surface of the thin plate 2 may be reduced.