Nuflare Technology, Inc.

Nuflare Technology America, Inc.

Chising Lai

Victor Katsap

Yoshikuni Goshima

Seiichi Tsuchiya

Yoshimasa Sanmiya

John William Kay

A system for determining Schottky thermal field emission (TFE) usable current and brightness of a Schottky TFE source is provided, the system including: one or more processors, configured to: acquire and store in a memory a Schottky TFE emission image in a digital format; and determine Schottky TFE usable beam current and brightness for the based on experimentally developed algorithms that utilize usable current criteria and usable emission current density, the usable current criteria being generated based on properties of a central beam component and an outer beam component of Schottky TFE beam current.

Method and apparatus for usable beam current and brightness in Schottky thermal field emission (TFE)

The present disclosure is related to a Schottky thermal field emission (TFE) source for emitting an electron beam. Exemplary embodiments can provide the acquisition of high-resolution emission images of Schottky TFE source and compute usable beam current and brightness based on experimentally developed usable current criteria. Advantages of these exemplary embodiments include: (1) obtaining usable beam current and brightness of a Schottky TFE source can be important with reference to Schottky TFE development and quality inspection, and (2) optimizing Schottky TFE operation modes so as to maximize Schottky TFE usable beam current and brightness can enable operation of multi-beam electron optical tools.

A digital-to-analog converter (DAC)/amplifier testing system for use in an electron-beam (e-beam) mask writer, the e-beam mask writer including a plurality of DAC/amplifier circuits to output analog voltage signals, each DAC/amplifier circuit having a first output terminal and a second output terminal, the first output terminals of the plurality of DAC/amplifier circuits being respectively coupled to deflection plates of the e-beam mask writer to provide the output analog voltages as deflection voltages, is provided. The testing system including a summation circuit to sum voltage signals and to output a summation signal indicating the sum of the received analog voltage signals and an analyzer circuit to digitize the summation signal and to detect to compare the digitized summation signal with an error tolerance range to detect whether at least one of the DAC/amplifier circuits is experiencing an operating error.

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Hopewell Junction, NY, United States of America

Chising Lai