Virtual addressing for E-beam lithography

In the fabrication of integrated circuits in a particle beam apparatus, the steps in the process comprising,

• forming a particle beam of the desired diameter thus defining a pixel,
• providing a workpiece to be irradiated by said beam on a support with said beam forming pixels on said workpiece,
• scanning said workpiece in one direction by said beam,
• moving said workpiece in a direction at right angles to the scanning direction of said beam,
• the movement of said workpiece in a direction at right angles to said beam scanning direction being synchronized with the movement of said beam,
• blanking and unblanking said beam as it scans said workpiece to form lines of pixels and gaps therebetween to define features on said workpiece,
• blanking said beam adjacent said features to change said features by approximately 1/2 a pixel width when said workpiece is finally processed, and finally,
• processing said workpiece.

A method of defining a pattern on a resist material by electron beam technology, comprising;

• forming a desired pattern comprising a main pattern and an enlargement thereof on a grid of a computer aided design machine,
• said main pattern and enlargement together being larger in one or more directions on said grid by approximately 1/2 a grid unit,
• transferring and transposing said main pattern and enlargement on a bit map as data with alternate bits corresponding to the 1/2 machine unit along the edges of the main pattern thereby defining said enlargement,
• transferring said bit map data to an electron beam machine,
• controlling said electron beam of said electron beam machine so as to expose said resist material in said electron beam machine according to the bit map data thereby defining the main pattern with alternate exposed pixels adjacent said main pattern where latter form said enlargement, and
• developing said resist material to form a main pattern on said resist enlarged by approximately 1/2 a pixel width.