Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Ebara Corporation

Other

Akiyoshi Suzuki

Hideki Ina

Michio Kohno

Miyoko Noguchi

Kenji Saitoh

Masao Kosugi

Miyoko Kawashima

Haruna Kawashima

Masao Totsuka

Masato Muraki

Makoto Torigoe

Seiji Takeuchi

Kenji Yamazoe

Tetsuya Mori

Minoru Yoshii

Mitsuro Sugita

Eiichi Murakami

Ryozo Hiraga

Ken-ichiro Shinoda

Hideki Yoshinari

Ichiro Kano

Yoshiyuki Sekine

Mitsuru Hiura

Toshio Matsubara

Tomoyuki Uchimura

Naoyuki Inoue

Hiroshi Echizen

Yasuo Ogino

Yuzo Kato

Yumiko Ohsaki

Shunzo Imai

Tomoyoshi Irie

Hiroki Nakamura

Mamoru Miyawaki

Takahiro Matsumoto

Kazuo Takahashi

Hiroshi Sato

Toshihiko Tsuji

Tadahiro Ohmi

Yuichi Yamada

Yuichi Iwasaki

Takahisa Shiozawa

Ryusho Hirose

Seiya Miura

Akinori Ohkubo

Kazuhiro Takahashi

Yoshiharu Kataoka

Fumio Sakai

Takashi Omata

Tsuneo Kanda

Masakatsu Ohta

Kazuhito Outsuka

Hisayuki Shimada

Shigeki Ogawa

Masao Tozuka

Ichiro Ishiyama

Masakatsu Ota

Shouji Tanaka

Shigeki Shimomura

Masakatu Ohta

Hitoshi Fukuda

Hirosi Sato

Terumasa Sakai

An apparatus for bringing a mold having a pattern region and a first mark into contact with an imprint material on a substrate having a second mark, includes a deforming mechanism configured to deform the mold such that a portion of the mold where the first mark is formed protrudes toward the substrate, a driving mechanism configured to adjust a distance between the mold and the substrate, and a detecting unit configured to detect, after the driving mechanism starts an operation of reducing the distance, the first mark and the second mark in a state in which the portion of the mold and the imprint material on the substrate are in contact with each other but a whole of the pattern region is not in contact with the imprint material.

Imprint apparatus and article manufacturing method

An imprint apparatus cures an imprint material, while a pattern formed on a mold is kept in contact with the imprint material, thereby transferring the pattern onto the imprint material. The apparatus includes a measurement unit which performs, in parallel, alignment measurement in which a relative position between the mold and a shot region on the substrate, to which the pattern is to be transferred, is measured so as to align the mold and the shot region, and overlay measurement in which a relative position between a first pattern already formed in another shot region on the substrate using the mold, and a second pattern underlying the first patter is measured.

Imprint apparatus including alignment and overlay measurement

An exposure apparatus that exposes a pattern of an original onto a substrate includes a condenser optical system configured to split light from a light source into plural rays, to condense the plural rays at different positions on the original, and to make a central part of each of the plural rays that illuminate the original darker than a periphery at the Fourier transform plane with respect to the original, and a projection optical system configured to project the pattern of the original onto the substrate.

Exposure apparatus

An exposure apparatus includes an illumination optical system for illuminating the reticle using the ultraviolet light from the light source, and a polarization measuring unit measuring the polarization state of the ultraviolet light, the polarization measuring unit including an optical unit for providing at least three different phase differences to the ultraviolet light that has passed at least part of the illumination optical system, a polarization element for providing a different transmittance in accordance with a polarization state of the ultraviolet light that has passed the optical unit, and an image pickup device for detecting a light intensity of the ultraviolet light that has passed the polarization element, the polarization measuring unit measuring the polarization state of the ultraviolet light that has passed the at least part of the illumination optical system based on a detection result of the image pickup device.

Exposure apparatus and device manufacturing method

An exposure apparatus which includes a projection optical system that projects a pattern image of a reticle onto an object to be exposed, and an interferometer configured to measure an optical characteristic of the projection optical system. The interferometer includes a mask placed on an object plane side of the projection optical system, the mask shaping a wavefront of light from a light source into an ideal wavefront, a detector configured to detect the light passing through the projection optical system; and an optical element placed between the mask and the projection optical system or between the projection optical system and the detector. The detector detects interference fringes (an interferogram) formed by interference between a reflected component of the light reflected by the optical element and a transmitted component of the light passing through the optical element.

Exposure apparatus and device manufacturing method using the apparatus

A phase measuring apparatus for measuring phase characteristics of a film applied onto an object to be measured includes a shearing interference system for providing incident light onto the object or light reflected on the object with shearing interference, a detector for detecting shearing interference information, and a computing unit for calculating the phase characteristics of the film based on the shearing interference information.

Phase measuring method and apparatus for measuring characterization of optical thin films

An exposure method comprising the steps of forming onto a mask that arranges a pattern of a contact hole and a plurality of patterns each being smaller than the contact hole pattern, and illuminating the mask using plural kinds of light so as to resolve the desired pattern without the smaller patterns on a target via a projection optical system.

Exposure method and apparatus

A mask arranges a predetermined pattern and an auxiliary pattern smaller than the predetermined pattern so that where a virtual lattice is assumed which has a lattice point located at a center of the predetermined pattern, a center of the auxiliary pattern is offset from the lattice point of the virtual lattice.

Mask and its manufacturing method, exposure, and device fabrication method

An illumination optical system for illuminating an illuminated surface using light from a light source includes a first diffraction optical element upon which the light from the light source is incident, and a second diffraction optical element upon which the light from the light source is incident, wherein the light from the first diffraction optical element forms a first part of an illumination distribution on a predetermined surface that substantially has a Fourier transform relationship with the illuminated surface, and the light from the second diffraction optical element forms a second part of the illumination distribution.

Illumination optical system and exposure apparatus using the same

An exposure method immerses, in liquid, a surface of an object to be exposed, and a surface of a projection optical system closest to the object, and projects a repetitive pattern formed on a mask via the projection optical system onto the object. The exposure method may direct exposure light having a wavelength &#x3bb; through a projection optical system that is at least partially immersed in liquid and has a numerical aperture of n&#xb7;sin &#x3b8;greater than 0.9 in order to transfer a pattern formed on a mask onto an object to be exposed, wherein nis a refractive index of the liquid, &#x394;n is the fluctuation of the refractive index of the liquid, &#x3b8;is the largest angle common to the liquid and a resist material applied to the object to be exposed, and d is a thickness of the liquid in an optical-axis direction of the projection optical system which satisfies d&#x2266;(0.03&#x3bb;) cos &#x3b8;/&#x394;n.

Exposure apparatus and method

There is provided an interferometer for measuring a surface shape of an optical element using interference, including a reference wave-front generating unit for generating a reference wave front for measuring the surface shape, which is provided in a target optical path, and includes an Alvarez lens.

Interferometer and interferance measurement method

A method for setting a mask pattern and an illumination condition suitable for an exposure method for using plural kinds of light to illuminate a mask that arranges a predetermined pattern and an auxiliary pattern smaller than the predetermined pattern, so as to resolve the predetermined pattern without resolving the auxiliary pattern on a target via a projection optical system includes the steps of forming data for the predetermined pattern, forming data for the auxiliary pattern, and setting the illumination condition for defining an effective light source of illumination using the plural kinds of light.

Method for setting mask pattern and illumination condition

An exposure method that transfers a pattern formed on a mask onto an object to be exposed via a projection optical system that is at least partly immersed in liquid. The exposure method forms on a pupil of the projection optical system an effective light source that emits, from an axis orthogonal to an optical axis of the projection optical system, light that has an incident angle &#x3b8; upon the object, wherein the light includes only s-polarized light in an area of an incident angle &#x3b8; that satisfies 90&#xb0;&#x2212;&#x3b8;&#x2266;&#x3b8;&#x2266;&#x3b8;, where &#x3b8;is the largest value of the incident angle &#x3b8;.

Phase measurement apparatus for measuring characterization of optical thin films

Growing community of inventors

Tokyo, Japan

Akiyoshi Suzuki