TECHNOVA                                                       

Extreme - Ultraviolet Lithogarphy

“The semiconductor industry has reached an important milestone on the path to producing 10GHz chips. “ 

Silicon has been the heart of the world's technology boom for nearly half a century, but microprocessor manufacturers have all but squeezed the life out of it. The current technology used to make microprocessors will begin to reach its limit around 2005. At that time, chipmakers will have to look to other technologies to cram more transistors onto silicon to create more powerful chips. Many are already looking at extreme-ultraviolet lithography (EUVL) as a way to extend the life of silicon at least until the end of the decade.

 This paper discusses the basic concepts and current state of development of EUV lithography (EUVL), a relatively new form of lithography that uses extreme ultraviolet (EUV) radiation with a wavelength in the range of 10 to 14 nanometers (nm) to carry out projection imaging. . However, some time around the year 2005, so-called Next-Generation Lithography’s will be required. EUVL is one such technology vying to become the successor to optical lithography. This paper provides an overview of the capabilities of EUVL, and explains how EUVL might be implemented. The challenges that must be overcome in order for EUVL to qualify for high-volume manufacture are also discussed.                                                 

 NEED FOR EUV TECHNOLOGY

Each year, manufacturers bring out the next great computer chip that boosts computing power and allows our personal computers to do more than we imagined just a decade ago. Intel founder Gordon Moore predicted this technology phenomenon more than 35 years ago, when he said that “the number of transistors on a microprocessor would double every 18 months”. This became known as Moore's Law.  

Industry experts believe that deep-ultraviolet lithography will reach its limits around 2004 and 2005, which means that Moore's law would also come to an end without a new chipmaking technology. But once deep-ultraviolet hits it’s ceiling, we will see chipmakers move to a new lithography process that will enable them to produce the industry's first 10-gigahertz (GHz) microprocessor by 2007. By comparison, the fastest Intel Pentium 4 processor (as of May 2001) is 2.4 GHz. EUVL could add another 10 years to Moore's Law.  

As of 2001, microchips being made with deep-ultraviolet lithography are made with 248-nanometer light. As of May 2001, some manufacturers are transitioning over to 193-nanometer light. With EUVL, chips will be made with 13-nanometer light. Based on the law that smaller wavelengths create a better image, 13-nanometer light will increase the quality of the pattern projected onto a silicon wafer, thus improving microprocessor speeds.