Control Data Corporation

Hughes Danbury Optical Systems, Inc.

John R Burgess

Donald O Smith

David M Walker

William G McKinley

Sterling P Newberry

Bernhard P Piwczyk

A deformable substrate chuck includes a deformable mounting plate supported by a plurality of individually controllable variable-length actuators. Each actuator is controllable to vary the height of the portion of the deformable mounting plate which it supports. A chamber within the mounting plate accessible through a vacuum port can be evacuated to hold a substrate such as a semiconductor wafer or a flat panel display to a porous top surface of the mounting plate. An optical sensing system senses the shape of the substrate and generates control signals used to control the lengths of the variable-length actuators to control the shape of the substrate.

Mounting member method and apparatus with variable length supports

Resist coating on the surface of a semiconductor wafer is removed by a one-step process using anisotropic reactive ion etching through an apertured stencil disposed close to but spaced from the resist-coated surface. The ion bombardment greatly enhances the plasma etch rate in the areas of the coating exposed through stencil apertures so that only the exposed areas are effectively etched during the limited exposure time in spite of the presence of chemically reactive gas between the stencil and other areas of the wafer surface. The technique is limited by low resolution but is ideally suited for clearing resist from atop fiducial marks used to align the wafer with multiple wafers in an integrated circuit chip.

Low defect etching of patterns using plasma-stencil mask

A combined fine focusing micro lens array and micro deflector assembly for use in electron beam tubes of the fly's eye type is provided. The assembly comprises a fine focusing micro lens array sub-assembly formed from a plurality of spaced-apart stacked parallel thin planar apertured silicon semiconductor lens plates each having an array of micro lens aperture openings. The lens plates each have highly conductive surfaces and are secured to glass rods for holding the plates in stacked parallel spaced-apart relationship with the apertures axially aligned in parallel. A micro deflector assembly is adjacent to the micro lens array sub-assembly. A micro deflector element axially aligned with each respective fine focusing lens element serves for deflecting an electron beam passing through along orthogonal x-y directional axes of movement normal to the electron beam path. The deflector elements are comprised by two orthogonally arrayed sets of parallel spaced-apart deflector bars with alternate bars of each set of deflector bars being interconnected electrically for common connection to a respective source of fine x-y deflection potential. The thin planar apertured silicon lens plates comprising the micro lens array are held together in stacked parallel assembled relationship by spaced-apart glass support rods whose longitudinal axes extend at right angles to the plates and to which the planar silicon lens plates are secured at their periphery. The two orthogonally arrayed sets of parallel spaced-apart deflection bars forming the sets of micro-deflector elements likewise preferably comprise parallel plates or bars of polycrystalline silicon having a highly conductive metalized surface. The micro deflector bars likewise are held in assembled spaced-apart parallel relationship by respective sets of spaced-apart parallel supporting glass rods whose longitudinal axes extend in a plane parallel to the plane of the deflector bars but at right angles thereto and to which the ends of the deflector bars are thermally bonded. The fine focusing micro lens array and micro deflector sub-assembly thus comprised, are secured together in assembled relation by additional glass support rods being disposed about the outer peripheries of the micro lens and micro deflector sub-assemblies and being secured thereto by thermal bonding such as by fusion.

Growing community of inventors

Dunstable, MA, United States of America

John R Burgess