Lithographic apparatuses suitable for, and methodologies involving, complementary e-beam lithography (CEBL) are described. In an example, a method of data compression or data reduction for e-beam tool simplification involves providing an amount of data to write a column field and to adjust the column field for field edge placement error on a wafer, wherein the amount of data is limited to data for patterning approximately 10% or less of the column field. The method also involves performing e-beam writing on the wafer using the amount of data.

Lithographic apparatuses suitable for, and methodologies involving, complementary e-beam lithography (CEBL) are described. In an example, a blanker aperture array (BAA) for an e-beam tool is described. The BAA is a non-universal cutter.

The conductive film of the present invention includes a conductive polymer (A) and has a film thickness of 35 nm or less, wherein: a surface resistance of the conductive film is 110.sup.11 /sq. or less, and a standard deviation of current that flows through the conductive film upon application of voltage to the conductive film is 5 or less. The conductor of the present invention has a substrate, and the conductive film provided on at least a part of the surface of the substrate. The resist pattern forming method of the present invention includes a lamination step of forming the conductive film on a surface of a resist layer including a chemically amplified resist, said resist layer formed on one surface of a substrate, and an exposure step of irradiating the substrate with an electron beam according to a pattern on its side on which the conductive film is formed. The laminate of the present invention has a resist layer and an antistatic film formed on the surface of the resist layer, wherein the antistatic film is the above-mentioned conductive film.

A method for fabricating a double-recess gate structure for an FET device that includes providing a semiconductor wafer having a plurality of semiconductor layers and depositing an EBL resist layer on the wafer. The method also includes patterning the EBL resist layer to form an opening in the EBL resist layer and performing a first wet etch to form a first recess in the wafer. The method further includes depositing a dielectric layer over the EBL resist layer and into the first recess and performing a dry etch to remove a portion of the dielectric layer in the first recess. The method also includes performing a second wet etch through the opening in the dielectric layer to form a second recess, and depositing a gate metal layer in the first and second recesses and in the opening in the EBL resist layer to form a gate terminal.

The present disclosure provides a method that includes forming a first patternable material layer on a substrate; forming a second patternable material layer over the first patternable material layer; and performing a charged particle beam lithography exposure process to the first patternable material layer and the second patternable material layer, thereby forming a first latent feature in the first patternable material layer.

The present disclosure provides one embodiment of an IC method. First pattern densities (PDs) of a plurality of templates of an IC design layout are received. Then a high PD outlier template and a low PD outlier template from the plurality of templates are identified. The high PD outlier template is split into multiple subsets of template and each subset of template carries a portion of PD of the high PD outlier template. A PD uniformity (PDU) optimization is performed to the low PD outlier template and multiple individual exposure processes are applied by using respective subset of templates.

Techniques are disclosed for forming a compacted array of functional cells using next-generation lithography (NGL) processes, such as electron-beam direct write (EBDW) and extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL), to form the boundaries of the cells in the array. The compacted array of cells may be used for field-programmable gate array (FPGA) structures configured with logic cells, static random-access memory (SRAM) structures configured with bit cells, or other memory or logic devices having cell-based structures. The techniques can be used to gain a reduction in area of 10 to 50 percent, for example, for the array of functional cells, because the NGL processes allow for higher precision and closer cuts for the cell boundaries, as compared to conventional 193 nm photolithography. In addition, the use of NGL processes to form the boundaries for the cells may also reduce lithography induced variations that would otherwise be present with conventional 193 nm photolithography.

The present invention provides a conductive polymer composition including: (A) a -conjugated conductive polymer having at least one repeating unit shown by the following general formulae (1-1), (1-2), and (1-3); and (B) a dopant polymer which contains a repeating unit a shown by the following general formula (2) and has a weight-average molecular weight in a range of 1,000 to 500,000. The inventive conductive polymer composition has excellent antistatic performance in electron beam-resist drawing as well as good applicability onto a resist and peelability with H.sub.2O and an alkaline solution, thereby being suitably used for electron beam lithography.

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A dynamic pattern generator (DPG) device and method of making a DPG device are disclosed. The DPG device is used in semiconductor processing tools that require multiple electron-beams, such as direct-write lithography. The device is a self-aligned DPG device that enormously reduces the required tolerances for aligning the various electrode layers, as compared to other design configurations including the non-self-aligned approach and also greatly simplifies the process complexity and cost. A process sequence for both integrated and non-integrated versions of the self-aligned DPG device is described. Additionally, an advanced self-aligned DPG device that eliminates the need for a charge dissipating coating or layer to be used on the device is described. Finally, a fabrication process for the implementation of both integrated and non-integrated versions of the advanced self-aligned DPG device is described.

The present disclosure provides one embodiment of a mask for a lithography exposure process. The mask includes a mask substrate; a first mask material layer patterned to have a first plurality of openings that define a first layer pattern; and a second mask material layer patterned to have a second plurality of openings that define a second layer pattern.