Performances of the CXrL x-ray beamlines (Poster Paper)

We report the first results on the performance of the new beamlines installed at CXrL. Three new lines have become operational in 1991, bringing the total of ports in use at the Center to five. The High-Flux beamline (Exposure Station #2) was commissioned in November 1991, and delivers a high-intensity spot of radiation for accelerated mask lifetime studies. Of the new beamlines, the Double Toroid beamline ('ES-3') is the one designed and built for the advanced 0.25 micron stepper, currently under development. The beamline employs an optical scanning method, and delivers a beam with a 2 mm FWHM in vertical, and a designed uniformity better than 2% across the 25 mm horizontal field. A 13 micron curved beryllium window is used to extract the beam in helium. First exposures were achieved in October 1991, and the beamline is now used to illuminate the Two State Alignment (TSA) system. As the name implies, the Karl Suss Stepper beamline ('ES-4') is the beamline designed and built to deliver radiation to a Karl Suss XRS-200 stepper, on loan from the IESS of Rome, Italy. This line was completed in November 1991, and the stepper was installed one week later. All of these three beamlines have exposure stations that are enclosed in a Class-10 cleanroom, in order to provide a contamination-free environment. We will present data on the characteristics of the radiation delivered to the exposure systems and on the initial performances of the various systems.