Two lasers boost euv power
Laser developer Powerlase and research partner University of Central Florida have made what they believe to be a major development in extreme ultraviolet lithography (euv). For the first time, according to the partners, two lasers have been combined to generate a laser produced plasma euv source. Professor Martin Richardson, Northrop-Grumman Professor of X-ray Photonics at UCF, pictured, noted: “The two Powerlase lasers have provided an ideal solid state laser driven plasma source required for euv lithography.”
Two Starlase lasers have been multiplexed together to increase the power aimed at the euv target. In this way, power has been more than doubled from 10W to 23W. This increases the power scalability of the approach.
Professor Richardson added: “The addition of a second laser has (brought) improvements not only in total output power, but also in power conversion efficiency. A direct scale up of our current system will permit a five fold increase in power, with additional lasers.”
Dr Samir Ellwi, vp of strategic innovations with Powerlase, said: “We are pleased to have achieved such a breakthrough. The collaboration with UCF has yielded positive results and our combined research is helping to prove that euv is a viable production method for delivering semiconductors with an accuracy of 32nm.”
