Charged-particle beam apparatus with large field-of-view and methods thereof

Abstract

Systems and methods of imaging a sample using a charged-particle beam apparatus are disclosed. The apparatus may include a charged-particle source configured to emit charged particles, an aperture plate configured to form a primary charged-particle beam along a primary optical axis from the emitted charged particles, a plurality of primary charged-particle beam deflectors configured to deflect the primary charged-particle beam to be incident on a surface of a sample to define a center of a field-of-view (FOV), and a controller including circuitry configured to apply a first excitation signal to a primary charged-particle beam deflector of the plurality of primary charged-particle beam deflectors to cause the primary charged-particle beam to scan a portion of the FOV of the sample, and apply a second excitation signal to cause the primary-charged particle beam deflector to compensate for an off-axis aberration of the primary charged-particle beam in the portion of the FOV.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.