Re: Revolution in chip manufacturing!!

john larkin <jl@glen--canyon.com> wrote:

On Tue, 31 Dec 2024 05:51:39 GMT, Jan Panteltje <alien@comet.invalid>
wrote:
 

Engineering researchers develop deep-UV microLED display chips for maskless
photolithography
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/12/241230131942.htm
Source:
Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
Summary:
In a breakthrough set to revolutionize the semiconductor industry,
engineers have developed the world's first-of-its-kind deep-ultraviolet
(UVC) microLED display array for lithography machines.
This enhanced efficiency UVC microLED has showcased the viability of a
lowered cost maskless photolithography
through the provision of adequate light output power density, enabling
exposure of photoresist films in a shorter time.
 
High-Power AlGaN Deep-Ultraviolet Micro-Light-Emitting Diode Displays
for Maskless Photolithography
Now everybody and their cat cam make nano nano chips?
End of ASML?
Go short on them?
 
 

 
There's another outfit that is serious about going after ASML.
 
https://www.xlight.com/
 
The idea is to make a rather large electron accelerator and use that
to build an EUV free-electron laser.
 
That's all I can say.
 
 

Resin-based 3D printing does amazingly well with bog standard 4k LCDs and
UV LEDs, achieving 20 micron voxel size. Simon uses it for his
automatically generated cradles for test jigs. 

I’m a fan.

Chip litho has been better than that since the dawn of the planar process.
You can easily do 5 microns with contact printing, even if you’re a bit
cross-eyed.

A lot of the advances in lithography technology are based on using the very
high contrast of photo resist to multiply resolution.

You expose using a dose that just exceeds the resist threshold to make a
grid of narrow lines spaced by a bit more than half a wavelength. (Details
vary depending on the numerical aperture and refractive index.)

Then you develop the resist, forming the narrow lines. Repeat once for 2x
resolution, or three times for 4x.

Once you have this grating structure, you have to cut the lines in
appropriate places to form the actual circuit outline. This is harder.

Also, of course you have to lay out your circuit so that this highly
restricted geometry can build it. Not too easy, but that’s how chips have
been made for many years now.

All of which is very fiddly. 

State of the art litho is already using multiple exposures of 13.5 nm
light. That’s a photon energy of 92 eV, which dwarfs the band gap of any
material whatsoever. (Diamond is the champ at 5.5 eV.)

Thus there’s no way to make a LED with a wavelength that short.

A super high density array of super small 200-nm LEDs could be pretty
useful if it wasn’t too expensive, but you ain’t doing maskless litho at
advanced nodes with that.

There’s a _lot_ of money spent on litho R&D,
So perhaps there’s a way to do it using an array of LEDs and multiple
exposures, at least at nodes where 200 nm lithography still works.

Not going to replace advanced light sources and wafer scanners anytime
soon, and anyway the extreme-precision motion and positioning will still be
needed. 

Might be great for making semi-custom chips based on arrays of gates or
transistors.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs  Principal Consultant  ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics  Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics