(Photo source: Internet)
E-beam lithography (e-beam lithography; EBL) begin in the 1960s. It’s a kind of maskless lithography developed on the basis of electron microscopes for microcircuit research and manufacturing. It’s a key and infrastructure equipment for semiconductor manufacturing and nanoscience & technology. EBL is based on the interaction between high-energy electron beams and photoresist, causing the resist to change from long (short) chains to short (long) chains, thereby achieving exposure. Compared with projection lithography, it has higher resolution and is mainly used for making lithography masks, maskless direct writing and nanoscience and technology research.
Currently, there are three main types of EBL equipment in scientific research and industry: Gaussian beam (circular beam), deformed beam (rectangular beam) and multi-beam. Among them, EBL equipment with Gaussian beam has a relatively low-threshold and can flexibly expose any pattern, so it’s widely used in fundamental research in major universities and R&D institutions, while EBL equipment with deformed beam and multi-beam mainly serves mask manufacturing in the industry. For example, the masks manufacturing for EUV lithography currently only relied on EBL technology.
EBL equipment includes electro-optical systems, pattern generator systems, vacuum systems, and high-precision motion systems. Among them, the high-precision motion system is an extremely important component of the EBL equipment. Its main functions are to realize the splicing of electron beam exposure patterns, alignment and overlay engraving, focus adjustment, automatic loading and unloading, etc. Its motion accuracy, velocity, acceleration, performance of dynamic positioning and synchronous scanning are important factors affecting the imaging quality, overlay accuracy and throughput of the EBL equipment. At present, the motion systems of almost all brands of EBL equipment in the world has used laser interferometers for closed-loop control to ensure their motion and positioning accuracy.
Typical schematic diagram of electron beam lithography equipment (Photo source: Internet)
Based on many years of experience in the development of vacuum products and high-end motion systems, YiNGUAN Semiconductor could provide high-precision vacuum motion systems with nanoscale accuracy and laser interferometer closed-loop for EBL equipment, and completely has solved the localization of its key components, include but are not limited to vacuum-compatible laser interferometers, vacuum-compatible piezoelectric motors, electrostatic chucks, vacuum-compatible cables, etc.
At present, YiNGUAN Semiconductor has developed different types of piezoelectric motor products, and all of them could customized vacuum-compatible. Vacuum-compatible cables have been supplied to domestic customers in batches. Electrostatic chucks have been mass-produced, supplied to many domestic customers, and are running stably in domestic head Fab factories. The high-vacuum XY stage used in electron beam inspection equipment has been mass-produced and has been supplied to many domestic customers in batches. It is running stably in the domestic head Fab factory, with position stability up to ±2nm and speed uniformity. <0.1% (speed is 100mm/s).
