A new advanced e-beam reticle writing system HL-950M has been developed to meet requirements for the production of 130 nm node reticles as well as the development of 100 nm node reticles. In order to improve the critical dimension (CD) accuracy and pattern positioning accuracy, several new technologies have been introduced. Fine address size is realized by a newly developed control electronics that enables the system to handle address unit of 2.5 nm, providing four times higher resolution than that of the previous systems. Reconstruction of sub-sub-field (SSF) pattern data has been developed so that the same pattern is exposed twice with reconstructed SSF pattern data sets with different SSF boundaries, realizing better stitching and positioning accuracy. High accuracy proximity effect correction has been developed with a new second order proximity effect calculation scheme, particularly promising better CD linearity. As main results of the system evaluation, the global CD accuracy of 9 nm and the global pattern positioning accuracy of 15 nm have been obtained. The overall performance of the HL-950M system has satisfied the specifications required for the 130 nm node reticle production and 100nm node reticle development.
A new advanced e-beam reticle writing system HL-950M has been developed to meet requirements for the production of 130 nm node reticles as well as development of 100 nm node reticles. In order to improve the critical dimension (CD) accuracy and pattern positioning accuracy, several new technologies have been introduced on the basis of the field-proven technologies of the previous system HL-900M. Fine address size is realized by a newly developed control electronics2 that enables the system to handle address unit of 2.5 nm, providing four times higher resolution than HL-900M. Reconstruction of sub-sub-field (SSF) pattern data has been developed so that the same pattern is exposed twice with reconstructed SSF pattern data sets with different SSF boundaries, realizing better stitching and positioning accuracy. High accuracy proximity effect correction has been developed with a new second order proximity effect calculation scheme, providing better CD uniformity particularly against drastic change of the pattern density. As main results of the system evaluation, the global CD accuracy of 9 nm (3(sigma) ) and the global pattern positioning accuracy of 15 nm (3(sigma) ) have been obtained. The overall performance of the HL-950M system has satisfied the specifications required for the 130 nm node reticle production and 100nm node reticle development.
KEYWORDS: Control systems, Electromagnetism, Electron beam lithography, Resistors, Lithography, Analog electronics, Temperature metrology, Linear filtering, Digital electronics, Device simulation
A stable high-resolution electromagnetic deflection control circuit for an electron-beam lithography (EBL) system has been developed. This deflection control circuit has enabled an EBL system to deal with a wide deflection area of 2.5-mm square having fine address units for a pattern placement of 1.25 nm. The deflection-control circuit consists of a new digital to analog converter (DAC) circuit, whose resolution is 21 bits, and a low-drift current-amplifier circuit. To achieve such high-stability and high-resolution, we had to develop a low noise-current cell structure for the new DAC circuit, because the output-signal noise of the DAC circuit is a major source of interference at the desired resolution. A local temperature control technique has been incorporated into the circuit to reduce fluctuations of the deflection control signal caused by ambient thermal variations. The low noise-current cell structure, which consists of multiple current buffers and low-pass filters, is placed between a constant current source circuit and a differential-switch circuit for each bit of the DAC circuit. The simulation results of the DAC circuit showed that the output-signal noise of the DAC circuit could be reduced to less than 0.4 nm rms, which is small enough to achieve the desired resolution. As the results of the experimentally evaluation of the deflection control circuit show, the total noise of the deflection-control signal obtained was less than 0.6 nm rms and the signal stability obtained was better than 0.3 nm rms. An evaluation of the performance of the new EBL system to which the new deflection control circuit was applied, showed that the critical-dimension accuracy obtained was better than 5 nm (3sigma) and the positioning accuracy obtained was better than 10 nm (3sigma) for the area controlled by electromagnetic deflector.
A new concept of shot-by-shot leveling for high resolution stepper systems, profile-based- leveling, is presented. This detects the wafer surface profile using laser interferometry. From the detected profile, this system determines where on the LSI chip to focus, and controls the wafer stage for focusing and leveling. With an experimental setup, a profile detection repeatability of +/- 0.02 micrometers , a tilt measurement repeatability of +/- 0.24 (mu) rad and a tilt measurement linearity of +/- 1.4 (mu) rad were obtained.
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