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AssigneeUltratech Stepper, Inc.
InventorsAndrew M. Hawryluk, Yu Chue Fong, David G. Stites, Weijian Wang
Estimating the term…
A light tunnel (24) comprising a hollow light tunnel body (30) or a solid light tunnel body (80) having a central axis (A1 or A2), a reflective surface (42 or 84) facing the axis, and an output end (54 or 94) having an edge (60 or 106) with a chamfered surface (120 or 130) formed on the edge. The chamfered surface is designed to alter the reflective properties of the reflective surfaces of the light tunnel body near the output end so as to reduce or eliminate edge ringing from the light tunnel body edge. In the case of a knife-edge (340) placed at the output end of the light tunnel body, knife-edge ringing is eliminated by providing a light source (310) in the form of a laser with a large number of spatial modes (M2>30). The present invention is expected to be most useful in cases where time-averaging or other interference-eliminating means prove impossible or impractical, such as with applications requiring only one or a few high-irradiance light pulses that need to uniformly irradiate a workpiece.
A light tunnel comprising a light tunnel body having a central axis, a reflective surface facing said axis and an output end having an edge, with a chamfered surface formed on said edge.
An illumination uniformizer system comprising, in order along an optical axis:
A method of eliminating edge-ringing due to interference effects from coherent light passing through a light tunnel having a solid light tunnel body with an output end having an outer edge, comprising the steps of:
A method of eliminating edge-ringing due to interference effects from coherent light passing through a light tunnel having a hollow light tunnel body with an inner reflective surface and an output end having an inner surface edge, comprising the steps of:
A method of providing uniform illumination using a light tunnel with a knife-edge placed at an output end of the light tunnel, the method comprising the steps of:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.