Abstract

A high volume manufacturing (HVM) model of EUV Actinic Blank Inspection (ABI) tool has been developed for the purpose of detecting phase defects on EUV masks. Simulation has been carried out as to how defect aspect ratio (height/width) and illumination numerical aperture (NA) affect defect signal intensity (DSI). It shows that a higher illumination NA leads to a higher DSI for defects with low-aspect ratios. For example, if the illumination NA is changed from 0.07 to 0.1, DSI is expected to increase 20% or more for defects with an aspect ratio lower than 0.015. The ABI tool has shown an enhanced sensitivity, especially for low-aspect ratio defects, after its NA illumination is raised from its original 0.07 NA to 0.1 NA. Actual inspection results using programmed-defect masks show that DSI has increased significantly for defects with low aspect ratios while the signal intensities for defects with high aspect ratios remain the same.

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