EUV lithography is a complicated process with many factors affecting the production of the final image. The EUV light itself doesn’t directly generate the images, but acts through secondary electrons which are released as a result of ionization by incoming EUV photons. Consequently, we need to be aware of the fluctuations… Read More
On a DRAM chip, the patterning of features outside the cell array can be just as challenging as those within the array itself. While the array contains features which are the most densely packed, at least they are regularly arranged. On the other hand, outside the array, the regularity is lost, but the in the most difficult cases, … Read More
In recent advanced nodes, via and cut patterning have constituted a larger and larger portion of the overall BEOL mask count. The advent of SALELE [1,2] caused mask count to increase for EUV as well, resulting in costs no longer being competitive with DUV down to 3nm [3]. Further development by TEL [4] has shown the possibility for… Read More
Electron beam lithography is commercially used to directly write submicron patterns onto advanced node masks. With the advent of EUV masks and nanometer-scale NIL (nanoimprint lithography), multi-beam writers are now being used, compensating the ultralow throughput of a single high-resolution electron beam with the use… Read More
This past week we … Read More
– SPIE EUV & Photomask conference well attended with great talks
– Chip industry focused on next gen High NA EUV & what it impacts
– Do big chips=big masks? Another Actinic tool?
– AI & chip tools, a game changer- China pre-empting more sanctions
Many people either thought or assumed… Read More
Recent articles have focused much effort on studying the stochastic behavior of secondary electron exposure of EUV resists [1-4]. Here, we consider the implications of extending similar treatments to DUV lithography.
As before, the model uses pixel-by-pixel calculations of absorbed photon dose, followed… Read More
Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography is often represented as benefiting from the 13.5 nm wavelength (actually it is a range of wavelengths, mostly ~13.2-13.8 nm), when actually it works through the action of secondary electrons, electrons released by photoelectrons which are themselves released from ionization by absorbed… Read More
