Disclosed herein is charged particle beam device and a a method of operating a charged particle beam device, comprising forming a plurality of focused charged particle beamlets. Charged particles are directed from a charged particle source to a multi-aperture plate. A plurality of beamlets are passed through a plurality of apertures of the multi-aperture plate. The beamlets include an inner beamlet of charged particles and a plurality of outer beamlets of charged particles. The outer beamlets are focused to form a plurality of outer focal points on a virtual ring having a center along an optical axis, the outer beamlets subjected to a field curvature aberration, such that the virtual ring is axially displaced relative to a virtual focal point of an uncompensated inner beamlet. A compensated inner beamlet is focused to a compensated focal point. The inner beamlet is compensated to form the compensated inner beamlet; and the compensated focal point is coplanar with the virtual ring.

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.

A charged particle assessment tool including: 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, each capture electrode adjacent a respective one of the beam apertures, configured to capture charged particles emitted from the sample.

A multi charged particle beam inspection apparatus includes a plurality of sensors, arranged inside or on a periphery of a secondary electron image acquisition mechanism, to measure a plurality of interfering factors, a determination circuit to determine, for each interfering factor, whether change exceeding a corresponding threshold is a first case which returns to the original state within a predetermined time period, or a second case which does not return to the original state even if the predetermined time period has passed, and a comparison circuit to input a reference image of a region corresponding to the secondary electron image acquired, and compare the secondary electron image with the reference image, wherein in the case where change of the second case occurs, the secondary electron image acquisition mechanism suspends the acquisition operation of the secondary electron image, and calibrates a change amount of the multiple charged particle beams.

An aberration computing device (100) includes a fitting section (48) for fitting line profiles of a diffractogram taken in radial directions to a fitting function and finding fitting parameters of the fitting function and a computing section (49) for finding at least one of an amount of defocus and two-fold astigmatism, based on the fitting parameters.

A set of methods of processing a set of Kikuchi diffraction patterns acquired for a series of incident positions of an electron beam on a sample material are described. One such method involves the steps of identifying a first pattern in the set containing a matrix signal and suspected of additionally containing a secondary phase signal; identifying a second pattern close to the first pattern which contains a matrix signal without containing a secondary phase signal; modifying the contrast and intensity of either the first pattern or the second pattern, the modification depending on a relative property of the first and second patterns, resulting in a modified first or second pattern; and obtaining a secondary phase signal pattern by either i) if the first pattern was modified, subtracting the original second pattern from the modified first pattern; or ii) if the second pattern was modified, subtracting the modified second pattern from the original first pattern.

An electron microscope includes a monochromator, an image acquiring portion for obtaining an electron microscope image containing interference fringes of the electron beam formed by an aperture located behind the monochromator, a line profile acquiring portion for obtaining a plurality of line profiles passing through the center of the aperture on the EM image, an energy dispersion direction identifying portion for identifying the direction of energy dispersion of the monochromator on the basis of the line profiles obtained by the line profile acquiring portion, and an optics controller for controlling an optical system on the basis of a line profile in the direction of energy dispersion to bring the focal plane for the electron beam exiting from the monochromator into coincidence with the achromatic plane.

A system and a method of generating adaptively a TEM SADP image with high discernment according to inputted parameters are disclosed. The system for generating a diffraction pattern image includes a sample generating unit configured to generate a sample by using at least one of a parameter about a lattice constant, a parameter about relative location of atom in unit lattice and a parameter about a zone axis, a vector generating unit configured to generate a reciprocal lattice vector corresponding to the unit lattice, a light source generating unit configured to calculate brightness of an electron beam reached to atom in the generated sample and a diffraction pattern generating unit configured to generate synthetic diffraction pattern image by using the generated reciprocal lattice vector, the relative location of atom in the sample and the calculated brightness of the electron beam.

There is provided a charged particle beam apparatus including: a charged particle source; a condenser lens and an object lens for converging a charged particle beam from the charged particle source and irradiating the converged charged particle beam to a specimen; and plural image shift deflectors for deflecting the charged particle beam. In the charged particle beam apparatus, the deflection of the charged particle beam is controlled using first control parameters that set the optical axis of a charged particle beam to a first optical axis that passes through the center of the object lens and enters a predefined position of the specimen, and second control parameters that transform the first control parameters so that the first control parameters set the optical axis of the charged particle beam to a second optical axis having a predefined incident angle different from the incident angle of the first optical axis.

In one embodiment, a charged particle beam writing apparatus includes an estimator calculating an estimated value of a process parameter of a processing device at a scheduled timing at which a substrate as an object of pattern correction is processed in the processing device from a history of the process parameter of the processing device which performs a process after pattern writing, a predictor predicting dimension distribution of a pattern formed on the substrate by the processing device performing the process with the estimated value, a corrector correcting a design dimension based on the predicted dimension distribution, and a writer irradiating the substrate with a charged particle beam and writing the pattern based on the dimension corrected by the corrector.