Ims Nanofabrication Ag

Ims Nanofabrication Gmbh

Ims-Ionen Mikrofabrikations Systeme Gmbh

Robert Nowak

Gerhard Stengl

Elmar Platzgummer

Alfred Chalupka

Herbert Buschbeck

Gertraud Lammer

Hans Loschner

Herbert Vonach

Hans Loeschner

Heinrich Fragner

Adrian Bürli

Till Windischbauer

Stefan Eder

In a maskless particle multibeam processing apparatus, a particle beam is projected through a pattern definition system producing a regular array of beamlets according to a desired pattern, which is projected onto a target which moves at continuous speed along a scanning direction with respect to the pattern definition system. During a sequence of uniformly timed exposure steps the beam image is moved along with the target along the scanning direction, and between exposure steps the location of the beam image is changed with respect to the target. During each exposure step the target covers a distance greater than the mutual distance of neighboring image elements on the target. The location of the beam image at consecutive exposure steps corresponds to a sequence of interlacing placement grids, and after each exposure step the beam image is shifted to a position associated with a different placement grid, with a change of location generally including a component across the scanning direction, thus cycling through the set of placement grids.

Method for maskless particle-beam exposure

In a pattern-lock system of particle-beam apparatus wherein the imaging of the pattern is done by means of at least two consecutive projector stages of the projecting system, reference marks are imaged upon registering means to determine the position of the particle-beam, at the location of an intermediary image of the reference marks produced by a non-final projector stage, with the registering means being positioned at locations of nominal positions of an intermediary imaging plane. Furthermore, to produce a scanning movement over the registering means the reference beamlets are shifted laterally by means of deflector means provided in the pattern defining means in dependence of a time-dependent electric voltage.

Pattern lock system for particle-beam exposure apparatus

In a particle-optical projection system a pattern is imaged onto a target by means of energetic electrically charged particles. The pattern is represented in a patterned beam of said charged particles emerging from the object plane through at least one cross-over; it is imaged into an image with a given size and distortion. To compensate for the Z-deviation of the image position from the actual positioning of the target (Z denotes an axial coordinate substantially parallel to the optical axis), without changing the size of the image, the system includes a position detector for measuring the Z-position of several locations of the target, and a controller for calculating modifications of selected lens parameters of the final particle-optical lens and controlling said lens parameters according to said modifications.

Particle-optical projection system

A device ( ) for defining a pattern, for use in a particle-beam exposure apparatus ( ), said device adapted to be irradiated with a beam (lb,pb) of electrically charged particles and let pass the beam only through a plurality of apertures, comprises an aperture array means ( ) and a blanking means ( ). The aperture array means ( ) has a plurality of apertures ( ) of identical shape defining the shape of beamlets (bm). The blanking means ( ) serves to switch off the passage of selected beamlets; it has a plurality of openings ( ), each corresponding to a respective aperture ( ) of the aperture array means ( ) and being provided with a deflection means ( ) controllable to deflect particles radiated through the opening off their path (p ) to an absorbing surface within said exposure apparatus ( ). The apertures ( ) are arranged on the blanking and aperture array means ( ) within a pattern definition field (pf) being composed of a plurality of staggered lines (p ) of apertures. Each of the lines (p ) comprises alternately first segments (sf) which are free of apertures and second segments (af) which each comprise a number of apertures spaced apart by a row offset (pm), said row offset being a multiple of the width (w) of apertures, the length (A) of said first segments (sf) being greater than the row offset. In front of the blanking means ( ) as seen in the direction of the particle beam, a cover means ( ) is provided having a plurality of openings ( ), each corresponding to a respective opening ( ) of the blanking means and having a width (w1) which is smaller than the width (w2) of the openings ( ) of the blanking array means.

Maskless particle-beam system for exposing a pattern on a substrate

In a particle projection lithography system, an alignment system is used to determine alignment parameters to measure the position and shape of an optical image of a pattern of structures formed in a mask and imaged onto a target by means of a broad particle beam, by means of an apparatus with a plurality of alignment marks adapted to produce secondary radiation upon irradiation with radiation of said particle beam. In order to allow for a variation of the alignment parameters along the optical axis, the alignment marks are positioned outside the aperture of the alignment system for the part of the beam that generates said optical image, arranged at positions to coincide with particle reference beams projected through reference beam forming structures provided on the mask while said optical image is projected onto the target, and situated on at least two different levels over the target as seen along the directions of the respective reference beams.

Pattern lock system

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Vienna, Austria

Robert Nowak