An apparatus comprising a beam emitter to emit a beam comprising electrons, ions or laser-light photons toward a target substrate. A motion sensor to detect mechanical vibrations of the target substrate. The motion sensor is mechanically coupled to the target substrate, a processor coupled to an output of the motion sensor. The processor is to generate a vibration correction signal proportional to the mechanical vibrations detected by the motion sensor, and beam steering optics coupled to the processor. The beam steering optics are to deflect the beam according to the vibration correction signal to compensate for the mechanical vibrations of the target substrate.

According to one aspect of the present invention, a multiple electron beam inspection apparatus includes a reference image generation circuit generating reference images corresponding to the secondary electron images, in accordance with an image generation characteristic of a secondary electron image by irradiation of one beam; and a correction circuit generating corrected reference images in which, on the basis of deviation information between a figure pattern of the secondary electron image by irradiation of the one beam of the multiple primary electron beams and a figure pattern of a secondary electron image by irradiation of another beam different from the one beam of the multiple primary electron beams, a shape of a figure pattern of a reference image corresponding to the figure pattern of the secondary electron image by the irradiation of the another beam in the reference images is corrected.

An input lens is provided which has a large acceptance solid angle for electrons. The input lens is for use in an electron spectrometer and disposed between an electron source producing electrons and an electron analyzer in the electron spectrometer. The input lens has a reference electrode at a reference potential, a slit, first through nth electrodes, where n is an integer equal to or greater than three, arranged between the reference electrode and the slit, and a second mesh attached to the first electrode. The first through nth electrodes are arranged in this order along an optical axis. The second mesh is at a potential higher than the reference potential.

A multi-beam particle beam system includes a multi-aperture plate having a multiplicity of apertures. During operation, one particle beam of the plurality of particle beams passes through each of the apertures. A multiplicity of electrodes are insulated from the second multi-aperture plate to influence the particle beam passing through the aperture. A voltage supply system for the electrodes includes: a signal a generator to generate a serial sequence of digital signals; a D/A converter to convert the digital signals into a sequence of voltages between an output of the D/A converter and the multi-aperture plate; and a controllable changeover system, which feeds the sequence of voltages successively to different electrodes.

According to one embodiment, an atom probe inspection device includes one or more processors configured to change a two-dimensional position of a detected ion, detect two-dimensional position information of the ion and a flying time of the ion, identify a type of an element of the ion, generate first information under a first condition and second information under a second condition, and generate a reconstruction image of the sample from the first information and the second information.

A charged particle assessment tool includes: an objective lens configured to project a plurality of charged particle beams onto a sample, the objective lens having a sample-facing surface defining a plurality of beam apertures through which respective ones of the charged particle beams are emitted toward the sample; and a plurality of capture electrodes adjacent respective ones of the beam apertures and configured to capture charged particles emitted from the sample.

In one embodiment, a data processing method is for processing data in a writing apparatus performing multiple writing by using multiple beams. The data is for controlling an irradiation amount for each beam. The method includes generating irradiation amount data for each of a plurality of layers, the irradiation amount data defining an irradiation amount for each of a plurality of irradiation position, and the plurality of layers corresponding to writing paths in multiple writing, performing a correction process on the irradiation amounts defined in the irradiation amount data provided for each layer, calculating a sum of the irradiation amounts for the respective irradiation positions defined in the corrected irradiation amount data, comparing the sums between the plurality of layers, and determining whether or not an error has occurred in the correction process based on the comparison result.

A multi-beam particle beam system includes a multi-aperture plate having a multiplicity of apertures. During operation, one particle beam of the plurality of particle beams passes through each of the apertures. A multiplicity of electrodes are insulated from the second multi-aperture plate to influence the particle beam passing through the aperture. A voltage supply system for the electrodes includes: a signal a generator to generate a serial sequence of digital signals; a D/A converter to convert the digital signals into a sequence of voltages between an output of the D/A converter and the multi-aperture plate; and a controllable changeover system, which feeds the sequence of voltages successively to different electrodes.

The present application relates to a method and an apparatus for determining a wavefront of a massive particle beam, including the steps of: (a) recording two or more images of a reference structure using the massive particle beam under different recording conditions; (b) generating point spread functions for the two or more recorded images with a modified reference image of the reference structure; and (c) performing a phase reconstruction of the massive particle beam on the basis of the generated point spread functions and the different recording conditions, for the purposes of determining the wavefront.

A beam splitter for generating a plurality of charged particle beamlets from a charged particle source is disclosed. The beam splitter includes a plurality of beamlet deflectors, which each pass a beamlet along an optical axis. Each beamlet deflector includes a low order element and a corresponding high order element. Each low order element has fewer electrodes than each corresponding high order element; and each low order element is one of a plurality of low order elements; and each corresponding high order element is one of a plurality of high order elements.