• Korean Journal of Optics and Photonics
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.15-21
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• 1993

This paper describes the design and development of a KrF excimer laser stepper and discusses the detailed system parameters and characterization data obtained from the performance test. We have developed a deep UV step-and-repeat system, operating at 248 nm, by retrofitting a commercial modules such as KrF excimer laser, precision wafer stage and fused silica illumination and 5X projection optics of numerical aperture 0.42. What we have developed, to the basic structure, are wafer alignment optics, reticle alignment system, autofocusing/leveling mechanisms and environment chamber. Finally, all these subsystem were integrated under the control of microprocessor-based controllers and computer. The wafer alignment system comprises the OFF-AXIS and the TTL alignment. The OFF-AXIS alignment system was realized with two kinds of optics. One is the magnification system with the image processing technique and the other is He-Ne laser diffraction type system using the alignment grating on the wafer. 'The TTL alignment system employs a dual beam inteferometric method, which takes advantages of higher diffraction efficiency compared with other TTL type alignment systems. As the results, alignment accuracy for OFF-AXIS and TTL alignment system were obtained within 0.1 $\mu\textrm{m}$/ 3 $\sigma$ for the various substrate on the wafers. The wafer focusing and leveling system is modified version of the conventional systems using position sensitive detectors (PSD). This type of detection method showed focusing and leveling accuracies of about $\pm$ 0.1 $\mu\textrm{m}$ and $\pm$ 0.5 arcsec, respectively. From the CD measurement, we obtained 0.4 $\mu\textrm{m}$ resolution features over the full field with routine use, and 0.3 $\mu\textrm{m}$ resolution was attainable under more strict conditions.