An exposure apparatus exposes a substrate with illumination light via a liquid. A liquid immersion member of the exposure apparatus has a lower surface, a plurality of collection ports, and a plurality of supply ports. The lower surface has an opening through which illumination light passes. The collection ports are arranged at the lower surface to surround the opening, and the supply ports are arranged at the lower surface and between the opening and the collection ports to surround the opening, such that the liquid is supplied via the supply ports onto the substrate while the substrate is arranged opposite to a plane-convex lens of a projection optical system and such that the liquid is collected via the collection ports from the substrate.

A liquid immersion exposure apparatus and method expose a substrate with illumination light via liquid. A projection optical system has plural optical elements that include a lens contacting the liquid and a barrel supporting the optical elements, the lens provided on a front end part of the projection optical system and exposed from the barrel. A liquid immersion member around the lens forms a liquid immersion area between the lens and part of the substrate. A drive device having a magnetic floating type of motor moves a substrate stage below the projection optical system. The liquid immersion member has a supply port to supply the liquid below the projection optical system and a recovery port to recover the liquid. The supply port is outside the projection area, the recovery port surrounds the projection area and the supply port, and each of the supply and recovery ports faces the substrate stage.

An super-resolution system for nano-patterning is disclosed, comprising an exposure head that enables a super-resolution patterning exposures. The super-resolution exposures are carried out using electromagnetic radiation directed onto a medium using plasmonic structures, and in particular using plasmonic structures using specially designed super-resolution apertures, of which the bow-tie and C-aperture are examples. These specially designed apertures create small but bright images in the near-field transmission pattern. A printing head comprising an array of these apertures is held in close proximity to a medium for patterning. In some embodiments, a data processing system is provided to re-interpret the data to be patterned into a set of modulation signals used to drive the multiple individual channels and multiple exposures.

A liquid immersion exposure apparatus in which a substrate is exposed with an exposure beam, includes a projection optical system by which the substrate is exposed to the exposure beam, a first inlet disposed at a first position, which is capable of supplying a first liquid to a space adjacent to a bottom surface of the projection optical system, and a second inlet disposed at a second position which is different from the first position, the second inlet being capable of supplying a second liquid that is different from the first liquid to the space.

Provided are apparatuses and methods for super resolution imaging photolithography. An exemplary apparatus may include an illumination light generation device configured to generate illumination light for imaging a pattern included in a mask through the mask. The illumination light may include a high-frequency spatial spectrum such that a high-frequency evanescent wave component of spatial spectrum information for the light is converted to a low-frequency evanescent wave component after being transmitted through the mask pattern. For example, the illumination light generation device may be configured to form the illumination in accordance with a high numerical aperture (NA) illumination mode and/or a surface plasmon (SP) wave illumination mode.

In order to provide an information processing apparatus capable of obtaining a variation amount in an optical characteristic of an optical system provided in an exposure apparatus in consideration of a control for suppressing a temperature variation of the optical system, the information processing apparatus according to the present invention is configured to predict the variation amount in the optical characteristic of the optical system by inputting a target temperature of the optical system to a learning model, in which the learning model is a learning model obtained by machine learning.

A liquid immersion exposure apparatus in which a substrate is exposed with an exposure beam, includes a projection optical system by which the substrate is exposed to the exposure beam, a first inlet disposed at a first position, which is capable of supplying a first liquid to a space adjacent to a bottom surface of the projection optical system, and a second inlet disposed at a second position which is different from the first position, the second inlet being capable of supplying a second liquid that is different from the first liquid to the space.

Methods disclosed herein provide apparatus and methods for applying an electric field and/or a magnetic field to a photoresist layer without air gap intervention during photolithography processes. In one embodiment, an apparatus includes a processing chamber configured to apply an electric field to a substrate via a non-gas phase intermediate medium. Methods described herein include dissociation of a photoacid generator to generate anions and cations. The anions may be moved within the photoresist layer by the electric field to more precisely control the speed and location of acid generation and regeneration processes.

In accordance with an embodiment of the disclosure, a tip array can include an elastomeric tip substrate layer comprising a first surface and an oppositely disposed second surface, the tip substrate layer being formed from an elastomeric material; a plurality of tips fixed to the first surface, the tips each comprising a tip end disposed opposite the first surface, the tips having a radius of curvature of less than about 1 micron; and an array of heaters disposed on the second surface of the tip substrate layer and configured such that when the tip substrate layer is heated by a heater, a tip disposed in a location of a heated portion of tip substrate layer is lowered relative to a tip disposed in a location of an unheated portion of the tip substrate layer.

An super-resolution system for nano-patterning is disclosed, comprising an optical printing head that enables a super-resolution lithographic exposures compatible with conventional optical lithographic processes. The super-resolution exposures are carried out using light directed onto a medium using plasmonic structures, and in particular using plasmonic structures using specially designed super-resolution apertures, of which the bow-tie and C-aperture are examples. These specially designed apertures create small but bright images in the near-field transmission pattern. A printing head comprising an array of these apertures is held in close proximity to a medium for patterning. In some embodiments, a data processing system is provided to re-interpret the data to be patterned into a set of modulation signals used to drive the multiple individual channels and the multiple exposures.