International Business Machines Corporation

Alfred K K Wong

Alan Edward Rosenbluth

Scott Josef Bukofsky

A system and method is described for lithographically printing patterns on a semiconductor using combinations of illumination and mask patterns which are optimized together to produce the desired pattern. The method of optimizing both illumination and mask pattern allows the development of mask patterns that are not constrained by the geometry of the desired pattern to be printed. Thus, the method provides high quality images even when the desired printed patterns have critical dimensions that approach the resolution limits of a lithographic system. The resulting mask patterns using the method do not obviously correspond to the desired patterns to be printed. Such masks may include phase-shifting technology that use destructive interference to define dark areas of the image and are not constrained to conform to the desired printed pattern.

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Hong Kong, China

Alfred K K Wong