Computational Imaging Technology for Nanolithography

Abstract

The rapid advancement of modern electronic technology is founded on Moore’s Law, which stipulates an exponential increase in transistor densities, leading to more and more functionalities in an integrated circuit (IC). A critical challenge in IC manufacturing lies in the nanolithography process, where the circuit pattern on a wafer is imprinted through imaging a photomask. Because of the small feature size compared with the wavelength of the light source, image distortion is significant due to diffraction and other aberrations. Computational technology, together with the modeling of the imaging process, is now an essential process to design the source and mask patterns that can counteract the distortions and allow for the printing of small features.