Nikon Corporation

Hiroyuki Hirota

Osamu Tanitsu

Koji Shigematsu

Tomoyuki Matsuyama

Hirohisa Tanaka

Masaya Yamamoto

Yasushi Mizuno

Shinichi Kurita

Kouji Muramatsu

Norio Miyake

Ryuji Takaya

Risa Yoshimoto

There is disclosed a polarization-modulating element for modulating a polarization state of incident light into a predetermined polarization state, the polarization-modulating element being made of an optical material with optical activity and having a circumferentially varying thickness profile.

Polarization-modulating element, illumination optical apparatus, exposure apparatus, and exposure method

An illumination optical apparatus guides exposure light emitted from an exposure light source, to an illumination target object. The illumination optical apparatus has a plurality of spatial light modulation members arranged in an array form, and each spatial light modulation member is so configured that a plurality of reflecting optical elements each including a movable reflecting surface are arranged in an array form. At least one of the spatial light modulation members is arranged in an optical path of the light emitted from the light source.

Illumination optical apparatus, exposure apparatus, and device manufacturing method

An illumination optical system is one for illuminating a surface to be illuminated with light from a light source, which has a distribution forming optical system including an optical integrator and forming a pupil intensity distribution on an illumination pupil located behind the optical integrator, and an optical attenuator arranged on a predetermined surface in an optical path behind the optical integrator and having an attenuation characteristic of varying an attenuation rate depending upon an angle of incidence to the predetermined surface.

Illumination optical system, exposure apparatus, device manufacturing method, compensation filter, and exposure optical system

According to one embodiment, an illumination optical system comprises an optical integrator which forms a secondary light source on an illumination pupil plane in an illumination optical path of the illumination optical system with incidence of exposure light from a light source device thereinto; a first transmission filter arranged in an optical path of the exposure light emitted from a first surface illuminant of the secondary light source and having a transmittance characteristic varying according to angles of incidence of the exposure light; a second transmission filter arranged in an optical path of the exposure light emitted from a second surface illuminant of the secondary light source and having a transmittance characteristic varying according to the angles of incidence of the exposure light; and a rotation mechanism which rotates the first and second transmission filters so as to vary an angle of inclination thereof relative to the optical axis of the illumination optical system.

Illumination optical system, exposure apparatus, and device manufacturing method

Growing community of inventors

Fukaya, Japan

Hiroyuki Hirota