• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2004.10a
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• pp.912-915
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• 2004

A vacuum environment is very important for NGL(Next Generation Lithography) apparatuses such as EUVL(Extreme Ultra Violet Lithography) or EPL(Electron Projection Lithography) and so on. The performance of these systems is dominated by vacuum level of processing and positioning accuracy of a stage. So, ultra-precision stage usable in a high vacuum level is needed for the improved performance of these devices. In contrast to atmospheric condition, a special attention must be paid to guide bearing, actuator and other elements. In this paper, air bearing is adopted because of its very high motional accuracy. So, air bearing is designed to be vacuum compatible using differential exhaust method, which prevents air from entering into vacuum chamber. For this, leakage analysis is performed theoretically and verified from experiment.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2003.06a
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• pp.1207-1210
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• 2003

This paper deals with experiments for dynamic characteristics and performance evaluation of the 3-axis fine positioning stage developed in [1]. The features of the developed fine positioning stage are the long stroke due to the magnetically preloaded PZT actuators, the minimum motion crosstalk due to the use of a ball contact mechanism and the compact design. The dynamic characteristics of the actuator and the stage are tested with the preload changed in order to validate the actuator and the stage design. Performance evaluation is also made for the PZT actuators as well as the stage positioning accuracy. Experimental results show that the developed stage is accurate enough to be used for nanometer positioning.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.33 no.7
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• pp.579-586
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• 2016

This paper describes kinematic analysis of a 6-degrees-of-freedom (DOF) ultra-precision positioning stage based on a flexure hinge. The stage is designed for processes which require ultra-precision and high load capacities, e.g. wafer-level precision bonding/assembly. During the initial design process, inverse and forward kinematic analyses were performed to actuate the precision positioning stage and to calculate workspace. A two-step procedure was used for inverse kinematic analysis. The first step involved calculating the amount of actuation of the horizontal actuation units. The second step involved calculating the amount of actuation of the vertical actuation unit, given the the results of the first step, by including a lever hinge mechanism adopted for motion amplification. Forward kinematic analysis was performed by defining six distance relationships between hinge positions for in-plane and out-of-plane motion. Finally, the result of a circular path actuation test with respect to the x-y, y-z, and x-z planes is presented.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.16 no.3 s.96
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• pp.154-163
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• 1999

In this paper, an ultra precision positioning system has been developed using dual servo loop control. For positioning system having long distance with ultra precision , the combination of global stage and micro stage was required. A servo motor based ball screw is used as a global stage and the piezo actuator as a micro stage. For the improvement of positional precision, the digital Chebyshev filter is implemented in the developed to dual servo system. Therefore, the positional repeatability has been achieved within ${\pm}$ 10 mm, and this technique can be applied to develop precision semiconductor equipments such as lithography steppers and probers.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2004.10a
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• pp.800-803
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• 2004

The refractive index of the laser interferometer is compensated using the simultaneously measured variations of room temperature and humidity in the method. In order to investigate the limit of compensation, the stationary test against two fixed reflectors mounted on the zerodur plate is performed firstly. From the experiment, it is confirmed that the measuring error of the laser interferometer can be improved from 0.12$\mu$m to 0.17$\mu$m by the application of the method. Secondly, for the verification of the compensating effect, it is applied to estimate the positioning accuracy of an ultra precision aerostatic stage. Two times of the refractive index compensation are performed to acquire the positioning error of the stage from the initially measured data, that is, to the initially measured positioning error and to the measured positioning error profile after the NC compensation. Although the positioning error of anaerostatic stage cannot be clarified perfectly, it is known that by the compensation method, the measuring error by the laser interferometer can be improved to within 0.15$\mu$m. English here.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.39-44
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• 2006

Ultra precision positioning mechanism has been widely used on semiconductor manufacturing equipments, optical spectrum analyzers and cell manipulations. Ultra precision positioning mechanism consists of several actuators, sensors, guides and control systems. Its efficiency depends on each performance of components. The object of this study is to design and analyze the micro stage that is one of the equipments embodied in ultra precision positioning mechanism. The micro stage consists of PZT actuators and flexure hinges. The structural design of flexure hinge is optimized by using RSM and FEM. The control factors concerned with the design of flexure hinges of stage and arms are optimized by minimizing the equivalent stress on the hinge and maximizing 1st natural frequency based on RSM and FEM simulation under various kinds of design conditions.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.112-117
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• 2012

This paper presents a new stopper mechanism for precision stage by using the Piezoelectric element actuator. The new stage including a new stopper mechanism has the precision positioning mechanism that was been developed for generation displacements with nanometer accuracy and a millimeter dynamic range simulataneouly. The stage is composed not of the mechanical two stopper but of only one Piezoelectric element actuator. The characteristics for the new stage and the stopper have been evaluated experimentally. As the results, we can know that the linearity error characteristics of stage is 30nm in the $20{\mu}m$ measurement range. In addition, the experimental results are confirmed the possibility of the movement in millimeter range.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2004.10a
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• pp.894-897
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• 2004

In this paper, we address a position control scheme for a stage system, which is levitated and driven by electric magnetic actuators. This consists of a levitating object (called platen) with 4 permanent magnetic linear synchronous motors in parallel. Each motor generates vertical force for suspension against gravity and propulsion force horizontally as well. This stage can generate six degrees of freedom motion by the vertical and horizontal forces. Dynamic equations of the stage system are derived based on Newton-Euler method and its special Jacobian matrix describing a relation between the Joint velocity and platen velocity is done. There are proposed two control schemes for positioning, which are Cartesian space controller and Joint space controller. The control performance of the Cartesian space controller is better than the Joint space controller in task space trajectory while the Joint space controller is simpler than the Cartesian space controller in controller realization.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.452-460
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• 2002

The precision stage using a novel contact-free planar actuator based on magnetic farces, magnetized force and Lorentz farce, is suggested. In the promising magnetic structure, the mover is driven directly without any transmission mechanism, and doesn't need any auxiliary driver for its posture calibration. Then it is estimated that the proposed operating principle is very suitable for work requiring high accuracy and cleanness, or general-purpose nano-stage. In this paper, we discuss a driving principle of the planar system including the magnetic force generation mechanism, a framework for the force model, governing characteristics of the levitated plate, and a planar motion control of the constructed prototype. And experimental results are given to verify the derived theoretical model and a feasibility of the system.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Technology Engineers
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.756-760
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• 2011

This paper proposed an alignment stage driven by piezo actuators for alignment process of a contact-type lithography. Among contact-type lithography processes, an UV-curable nanoimprint process is an unique process to be able to align patterns on upper and lower layers. An alignment stage of the UV-curable nanoimprint process requires nano-level resolution as well as high stiffness to overcome friction force due to contact moving. In this paper, the alignment stage consists of a compliant mechanism using flexure hinges, piezo actuators for high force generation, and capacitive sensors for high-resolution measurement. The compliant mechanism is implemented by four prismatic-prismatic compliant chains for two degree-of-freedom translations. The compliant mechanism is composed of flexure hinges with high stiffness, and it is directly actuated by the piezo actuators which increases the stiffness of the mechanism, also. The performance of the ultra-precision stage is demonstrated by experiments.