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Why aren't we going electron lithography? As a laymen I think it should easily be able to surpass EUV in terms of resolution. I would imagine there are very goo
by rowanG077 3y ago
Why aren't we going electron lithography? As a laymen I think it should easily be able to surpass EUV in terms of resolution. I would imagine there are very good reasons why we aren't seeing it.
- barelyauser 3y agoYou may be able to surpass it in resolution but you can't surpass it in terms of throughput.
- _hypx 3y agoElectrons are electrically charged, so a beam of electrons will interfere with itself. The only way around this is to have a very narrow beam, but that kills throughput.
- bilsbie 3y agoHow about muons then?
- icapybara 3y agoHow should we produce the muons?
- m00x 3y agoMuonic generator, ofc.
- WantonQuantum 3y agoJust for the fun of it, I googled muon production and found this at the Paul Scherrer Institute in Switzerland: https://www.psi.ch/en/media/the-sms-muon-source https://www.psi.ch/en/media/the-sms-muon-source It does highlight some potential pitfalls. Chiefly the rapid decay of muons and dealing decay particles. Also you need a source of high energy protons. Proton lithograhy anyone?
- rowanG077 3y agoNeutron lithography would be better then. You don't have the charge issue.
- blackoil 3y agoConsidering everything is already in scifi zone. "By harnessing orgasms of space cats"
- ars 3y agoMuons are also electrically charged - how would that help anything?
- rowanG077 3y agoMuons are much heavier while having the same charge.
- icapybara 3y agoWell put.
- crote 3y agoBecause it has absolutely awful throughput. Electron-beam lithography has an output measured in days per wafer. Meanwhile, EUV can easily output 150+ wafers per hour. When the choice was made to go for EUV, E-Beam was actually the most mature technology available for next-gen lithography - but it just wasn't economically viable. The technology has remained in development over the years, but not a lot has changed yet. If you want to know more about the topic, I can strongly recommend this video from Asianometry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmgkV83OhHA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmgkV83OhHA
- rowanG077 3y agoI mean if the machine is 100x cheaper to buy/maintain it might still be worth it. The price for EUV in TCO per machine is insane.
- _hypx 3y agoIt would have to be on the order of 1,000-10,000x cheaper for it be worth it. Not to mention that each wafer needs dozens of layers to function. So you will need to wait a very long time for all the layers to be completed.
- patmorgan23 3y agoNot if the throughout is 1000x slower.
- zogomoox 3y agoIf China can't get their hands on EUV, E-Beam seems a logical step for them to develop anyway.