Applied Materials, Inc.

Ralf Hofmann

Majeed Foad

Cara Beasley

Vinayak Vishwanath Hassan

Zheng Xu

John C Forster

Li-Qun Xia

Nag B Patibandla

Mehdi Vaez-Iravani

Jeonghoon Oh

Praburam Gopalraja

Todd J Egan

Pravin K Narwankar

Thomas E Nowak

Vineet Haresh Mehta

Karl M Brown

Banqiu Wu

Byung-Sung Kwak

Stefan Bangert

Howard E Grunes

John Pipitone

Edward W Budiarto

Timothy B Michaelson

Toshiaki Fujita

Michael Koenig

Srinivas Satya

Nitin K Ingle

Abhijit Basu Mallick

Wei W Wang

Michael Wayne Stowell, Jr

Robert Jan Visser

Robert B Lowrance

Stephen Moffatt

Anantha K Subramani

Dieter Haas

Wolfgang R Aderhold

Brian T West

Kaushal Kishore Singh

Omkaram Nalamasu

Semyon Sherstinsky

Aihua Chen

Goichi Yoshidome

Kevin Vincent Moraes

Victor Pushparaj

Charles Gay

Soumendra N Barman

Fernand Dorleans

Rudy Beckstrom, Iii

Byung-sung Leo Kwak

An extreme ultraviolet mask and method of manufacture thereof includes: providing a glass-ceramic block; forming a glass-ceramic substrate from the glass-ceramic block; and depositing a planarization layer on the glass-ceramic substrate.

Glass ceramic for ultraviolet lithography and method of manufacturing thereof

A processing system includes: a vacuum chamber; a plurality of processing sub-systems attached around the vacuum chamber; and a wafer handling system in the vacuum chamber for moving the wafer among the plurality of processing systems without exiting from a vacuum. A physical vapor deposition system for manufacturing an extreme ultraviolet blank comprising: a target comprising molybdenum, molybdenum alloy, or a combination thereof.

Extreme ultraviolet lithography mask blank manufacturing system and method of operation therefor

An extreme ultraviolet (EUV) mask blank production system includes: a substrate handling vacuum chamber for creating a vacuum; a substrate handling platform, in the vacuum, for transporting an ultra-low expansion substrate loaded in the substrate handling vacuum chamber; and multiple sub-chambers, accessed by the substrate handling platform, for forming an EUV mask blank includes: a multi-layer stack, formed above the ultra-low expansion substrate, for reflecting an extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light, and an absorber layer, formed above the multi-layer stack, for absorbing the EUV light at a wavelength of 13.5 nm includes the absorber layer has a thickness of less than 80 nm and less than 2% reflectivity.

Extreme ultraviolet mask blank production system with thin absorber and manufacturing system therefor

A monitoring and deposition control system and method of operation thereof including: a deposition chamber for depositing a material layer on a substrate; a sensor array for monitoring deposition of the material layer for changes in a layer thickness of the material layer during deposition; and a processing unit for adjusting deposition parameters based on the changes in the layer thickness during deposition.

Monitoring system for deposition and method of operation thereof

Methods of processing a plurality of substrates using a processing chamber with bottom and top openings and a plurality of processing slots are provided. A substrate positioned on a carrier is loaded into a first end of a processing chamber body through the bottom opening. The carrier is moved through a plurality of processing slots to a top opening at a second end of the chamber body and then removed from the processing chamber through the top opening.

Methods for the continuous processing of substrates

An integrated extreme ultraviolet (EUV) blank production system includes: a vacuum chamber for placing a substrate in a vacuum; a first deposition system for depositing a planarization layer having a planarized top surface over the substrate; and a second deposition system for depositing a multi-layer stack on the planarization layer without removing the substrate from the vacuum. The EUV blank is in an EUV lithography system includes: an extreme ultraviolet light source; a mirror for directing light from the EUV source; a reticle stage for placing a EUV mask blank with a planarization layer; and a wafer stage for placing a wafer. The EUV blank includes: a substrate; a planarization layer to compensate for imperfections related to the surface of the substrate, the planarization layer having a flat top surface; and a multi-layer stack on the planarization layer.

System and method for manufacturing planarized extreme ultraviolet lithography blank

A magnetic handling assembly for thin-film processing of a substrate, a system and method for assembling and disassembling a shadow mask to cover a top of a workpiece for exposure to a processing condition. The assembly may include a magnetic handling carrier and a shadow mask disposed over, and magnetically coupled to, the magnetic handling carrier to cover a top of a workpiece that is to be disposed between the shadow mask and the magnetic handling carrier when exposed to a processing condition. A system includes a first chamber with a first support to hold the shadow mask, a second support to hold a handling carrier, and an alignment system to align the shadow mask a workpiece to be disposed between the carrier and shadow mask. The first and second supports are moveable relative to each other.

Shadow mask alignment and management system

An apparatus and method of manufacture of an extreme ultraviolet reflective element includes: a substrate; a multilayer stack on the substrate, the multilayer stack includes a plurality of reflective layer pairs having a first reflective layer formed from silicon and a second reflective layer formed from niobium or niobium carbide for forming a Bragg reflector; and a capping layer on and over the multilayer stack for protecting the multilayer stack by reducing oxidation and mechanical erosion.

Extreme ultraviolet reflective element with multilayer stack and method of manufacturing thereof

An extreme ultraviolet (EUV) mask blank production system includes: a substrate handling vacuum chamber for creating a vacuum; a substrate handling platform, in the vacuum, for transporting an ultra-low expansion substrate loaded in the substrate handling vacuum chamber; and multiple sub-chambers, accessed by the substrate handling platform, for forming an EUV mask blank includes: a first sub-chamber for forming a multi-layer stack, above the ultra-low expansion substrate, for reflecting an extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light; and a second sub-chamber for forming a bi-layer absorber, formed above the multi-layer stack, for absorbing the EUV light at a wavelength of 13.5 nm provides a reflectivity of less than 1.9%.

Planarized extreme ultraviolet lithography blank with absorber and manufacturing system therefor

Embodiments described herein provide methods and apparatus for forming graphitic carbon such as graphene on a substrate. The method includes providing a precursor comprising a linear conjugated hydrocarbon, depositing a hydrocarbon layer from the precursor on the substrate, and forming graphene from the hydrocarbon layer by applying energy to the substrate. The precursor may include template molecules such as polynuclear aromatics, and may be deposited on the substrate by spinning on, by spraying, by flowing, by dipping, or by condensing. The energy may be applied as radiant energy, thermal energy, or plasma energy.

Growing graphene on substrates

A processing chamber having a plurality of movable substrate carriers stacked therein for continuously processing a plurality of substrates is provided. The movable substrate carrier is capable of being transported from outside of the processing chamber, e.g., being transferred from a load luck chamber, into the processing chamber and out of the processing chamber, e.g., being transferred into another load luck chamber. Process gases delivered into the processing chamber are spatially separated into a plurality of processing slots, and/or temporally controlled. The processing chamber can be part of a multi-chamber substrate processing system.

Continuous substrate processing system

A method of manufacture of an extreme ultraviolet reflective element includes: providing a substrate; forming a multilayer stack on the substrate, the multilayer stack includes a plurality of reflective layer pairs having a first reflective layer and a second reflective layer for forming a Bragg reflector; and forming a capping layer on and over the multilayer stack, the capping layer formed from titanium oxide, ruthenium oxide, niobium oxide, ruthenium tungsten, ruthenium molybdenum, or ruthenium niobium, and the capping layer for protecting the multilayer stack by reducing oxidation and mechanical erosion.

Extreme ultraviolet capping layer and method of manufacturing and lithography thereof

Growing community of inventors

Soquel, CA, United States of America

Ralf Hofmann