A method to compensate for drift while controlling a charged particle beam (CPB) system having at least one charged particle beam controllable in position. Sources of drift include mechanical variations in the stage supporting the sample, beam deflection shifts, and environmental impacts, such as temperature. The method includes positioning a sample supported by a stage in the CPB system, monitoring a reference fiducial on a surface of the sample from a start time to an end time, determining a drift compensation to compensate for a drift that causes an unintended change in the position of a first charged particle beam relative to the sample by a known amount over a period of time based on a change in the position of the reference fiducial between the start time and the end time, and adjusting positions of the first charged particle beam by applying the determined drift compensation during an operation of the CPB system.

Methods include holding a sample with a movement stage configured to rotate the sample about a rotation axis, directing an imaging beam to a first sample location with the sample at a first rotational position about the rotation axis and detecting a first transmitted imaging beam image, rotating the sample using the movement stage about the rotation axis to a second rotational position, and directing the imaging beam to a second sample location by deflecting the imaging beam in relation to an optical axis of the imaging beam and detecting a second transmitted imaging beam image, wherein the second sample location is spaced apart from the first sample location at least at least in relation to the optical axis. Related systems and apparatus are also disclosed.

A multi-beam charged particle microscope and a method of operating a multi-beam charged particle microscope for wafer inspection with high throughput and with high resolution and high reliability are provided. The method of operation and the multi-beam charged particle beam microscope comprises a mechanism for a synchronized scanning operation and image acquisition by a plurality of charged particle beamlets according a selected scan program, wherein the selected scan program can be selected according an inspection task from different scan programs.

Provided is a method for adjusting a field-of-view of a charged particle microscope device, in which reference data for a sample is set, a plurality of regions of interest are set for the reference data, a rough sampling coordinate group is set for each of the plurality of regions of interest, the sample is irradiated with charged particles based on the sampling coordinate group to obtain a corresponding pixel value group, a plurality of reconstructed images corresponding to the plurality of regions of interest are generated based on the pixel value group, a correspondence relationship among the plurality of regions of interest is estimated based on the plurality of reconstructed images, and the plurality of regions of interest are adjusted based on the correspondence relationship. Here, the sampling coordinate group is set based on the reference data.

A 3D imaging system and method for a nanostructure is provided. The 3D imaging system includes a master control center, a vacuum chamber, an electron gun, an imaging signal detector, a broad ion beam source device, and a laser rangefinder component. A sample loading device is arranged inside the vacuum chamber. A radial source of the broad ion beam source device is arranged in parallel with an etched surface of a sample. The laser rangefinder component includes a first laser rangefinder configured to measure a distance from a top surface of an ion beam shielding plate and a second laser rangefinder configured to measure a distance from a non-etched area of the sample, the first laser rangefinder and the second laser rangefinder are arranged side by side, and a laser traveling direction is perpendicular to a traveling direction of the broad ion beam source device.

This cross-section observation device bombards an object with a charged particle beam to repeatedly expose cross-sections of the object, bombards at least some of the cross-sections from among the plurality of the exposed cross-sections with a charged particle beam to acquire cross-sectional image information describing each of the at least some of the cross-sections, generates for each of these cross-sections a cross-sectional image described by the cross-sectional image information acquired, and generates a three-dimensional image in which the generated cross-sectional images are stacked together. This cross-section observation device displays a first three-dimensional image along with a second three-dimensional image, the first three-dimensional image being a three-dimensional image from the stacking of first cross-sectional images, which are cross-sectional images of the cross-sections described by the corresponding cross-sectional image information acquired on the basis of a first condition, and the second three-dimensional image being a three-dimensional image from the stacking of second cross-sectional images, which are cross-sectional images of the cross-sections described by the corresponding cross-sectional image information acquired on the basis of a second condition.

A metrology method for use in determining one or more parameters of a patterned structure, the method including providing raw measured TEM image data, TEM.sub.meas, data indicative of a TEM measurement mode, and predetermined simulated TEM image data including data indicative of one or more simulated TEM images of a structure similar to the patterned structure under measurements and a simulated weight map including weights assigned to different regions in the simulated TEM image corresponding to different features of the patterned structure, performing a fitting procedure between the raw measured TEM image data and the predetermined simulated TEM image data and determining one or more parameters of the structure from the simulated TEM image data corresponding to a best fit condition.

The present invention enables an overlay error between processors to be measured from a pattern image, the SN ratio of which is low. To this end, the present invention forms a secondary electron image 200 from a detection signal of a secondary electron detector 107, forms a reflected electron image 210 from a detection signal of a reflected electron detector 109, creates a SUMLINE profile 701 that is obtained by adding luminance information in the reflected electron image along the longitudinal direction of a line pattern, and calculates an overlay error of a sample by using position information about an upper layer pattern detected from the secondary electron image and position information about a lower layer pattern that is detected by using an estimation line pattern 801 estimated on the basis of the SUMLINE profile from the reflected electron image.

Methods include providing a multi-pillar sample including at least a first pillar and a second pillar parallel with the first pillar, directing a charged particle beam to the first pillar, imaging the first pillar at a plurality of rotational positions by rotating the multi-pillar sample about a first pillar axis of the first pillar, directing the charged particle beam to the second pillar, and imaging the second pillar at a plurality of rotational positions by rotating the multi-pillar sample about a second pillar axis of the second pillar. Related apparatus for performing disclosed methods are disclosed. Multi-pillar samples are also disclosed.

A pattern inspection apparatus includes an actual outline image generation circuit to generate an actual outline image of a predetermined region defined by a function, where the gray scale value of each pixel in the predetermined region including plural actual image outline positions on an actual image outline of a figure pattern in an inspection image is dependent on a distance from the center of a pixel concerned to the closest actual image outline position in the plural actual image outline positions, and a reference outline image generation circuit to generate a reference outline image of the predetermined region defined by the function, where a gray scale value of each pixel in the predetermined region is dependent on a distance from the center of a pixel concerned to the closest reference outline position in plural reference outline positions on a reference outline to be compared with the actual image outline.