Computer-aided design and analysis of circuits and semiconductor – Nanotechnology related integrated circuit design
Reexamination Certificate
2001-02-02
2004-02-17
Garbowski, Leigh M. (Department: 2825)
Computer-aided design and analysis of circuits and semiconductor
Nanotechnology related integrated circuit design
C716S030000, C716S030000, C438S707000, C438S708000, C438S795000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06694503
ABSTRACT:
The application is based on application Nos. 2000-26462 and 2000-26463 filed in Japan, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a processing device and a processing method for processing a material with ultraviolet light or light having a shorter wavelength than the ultraviolet light. In particular, the invention relates to a processing device and a processing method for effecting fine processing to produce a three-dimensional part by irradiating a material with ultraviolet light or light of a shorter wavelength than the ultraviolet light and thereby removing the material, or changing physical or chemical properties of the material.
2. Description of the Related Art
(1) First Disadvantage
It has been demanded to provide a method of processing works or materials with high accuracy to produce finely processed parts such as components of micro-machines. Photolithography and others, which are used for manufacturing semiconductor integrated circuits, have been known as some kinds of fine processing method. The fine processing technique used for manufacturing the semiconductor integrated circuits is primarily a technique for arranging parts by layering a thin film on a two-dimensional plane. The technique can arrange a layer of only up to several micrometers in thickness. Therefore, this technique cannot be used for manufacturing a part having a three-dimensional structure, which requires processing on the order of tens to hundreds of micrometers in depth.
An LIGA method using X-rays by synchrotron radiation has been known as a fine processing method, which allows processing on the order of tens to hundreds of micrometers in depth. The LIGA method was developed in Germany, and “LIGA” is an abbreviation for German “Lithographie (lithography), “Galvanoformung (electro-forming)” and “Abformung (forming)”. The LIGA method is a technology utilizing a high rectilinear property and a high energy of X-rays.
In the LIGA method, resist made of polymethyl methacrylate, which will be referred to as “PMMA” hereinafter, is applied to a surface of a substrate to form a layer of hundreds of micrometers in thickness, and is irradiated with X-rays to cut of molecular chains of the resist. Then, development is performed to remove the resist from exposed portions. Using the remaining resist as a die, electro-casting is performed to form a structure of metal. Molding of plastics or the like can be performed using this metal structure as a die. Thereby, accurately and finely processed parts can be manufactured in large volume.
According to the LIGA method, a process of exposing a material uses a mask-having a transparent portion transparent to X-rays for restricting a region of the resist irradiated with X-rays. Since X-rays have a high rectilinear property, the region on the resist irradiated with X-rays has the same configuration as the transparent portion. Accordingly, the mask having the transparent portion of the same configuration as the processing configuration (i.e., configuration to be produced by the processing) is used.
As described above, the LIGA method can produce the three-dimensional structure, which has a uniform section perpendicular to the incident direction of X-rays as well as a thickness of hundreds of micrometers.
However, the conventional LIGA method uses the mask having the transparent portion of the same configuration as the intended process configuration. Therefore, it is impossible to produce a three-dimensional structure, of which section perpendicular to the incident direction of X-rays varies depending on the depth In view of this, such a manner may be envisaged that an X-ray mask having a transparent portion of a smaller configuration than the process configuration is employed, and is moved relatively to the resist so that the resist may be exposed to the X-rays in accordance with an exposure amount distribution corresponding to the process configuration.
However, the configuration of the transparent portion of X-ray mask does not match with the configuration of the section perpendicular to the incident direction of X-rays, and further a processing amount of the resist (i.e., an amount by which the resist is processed) in the depth direction varies depending on the position. Therefore, it is difficult to determine the pattern of movement of the X-ray mask so that the exposure amount distribution may correspond to the intended three-dimensional processing configuration. Accordingly, it is difficult to produce the three-dimensional structure, of which section perpendicular to the incident direction of X-ray varies in configuration depending on the depth.
(2) Second Disadvantage
In the prior art, nozzle bores, which are provided in an ink-jet record head for ejecting ink, are formed by press work, electro-casting, laser processing or the like. According to the press work, a nozzle plate is pressed and deformed by dies for forming the nozzle bores. This usually causes large errors during processing in the configurations of nozzle bores, and thus causes large variations in configuration. The electro-casting method is performed with a die formed of a resist pattern prepared by photolithography so that a nozzle plate having nozzles is directly prepared. In this electro-casting method, the processible sectional form of the nozzle bore is restricted, and the error in resist pattern directly affects the configuration of the nozzle plate. According to the laser processing method, the processible sectional form of the nozzle bore is restricted to only the vertical form, Further, an error occurs in the peripheries of nozzle bores during processing, resulting in variations in configurations of the nozzle bores.
According to the conventional manufacturing method, it is difficult to achieve both kinds of processing described above, i.e., the processing for producing a three-dimensional configuration, which has a processed depth varying depending on the position, and is employed, e.g., in the nozzle bore for ejecting ink in the inkjet record head, and the processing in which variations in configuration between the processed portions are suppressed.
If an error is present in configuration of the nozzle bore, and/or variations are present in configuration between the nozzle bores, the respective nozzles have different ink ejection characteristics. The ink ejection characteristics relate to a volume of ejected ink and an ejection speed. If variations are present in ink ejection characteristics between the nozzles, inconsistencies in density occur in printed portions. Particularly, in an ink-jet record head provided with a row of many nozzles, the ink-jet record head is scanned on a record medium in a direction perpendicular to the row of nozzles for printing so that inconsistencies in density between the nozzles result in stripes along the scanning paths. The stripe noises are conspicuous in many cases, and therefore remarkably lower image quantities. For printing beautiful images with less noises, it is very important to keep uniformity in ink ejection characteristics between the nozzles.
Methods such as photolithography used for producing a semiconductor integrated circuit are also know as the fine processing methods, which can perform extremely accurate and fine processing of parts such as an ink-jet record head provided with nozzle bores to be processed, In this fine processing technique used for manufacturing the semiconductor integrated circuit, parts are arranged primarily by layering a thin layer on a two-dimensional plane. This technique can arrange the layer of only several micrometers in thickness. Thus, this technique cannot be used for manufacturing parts having three-dimensional structures, which must have sizes in depth direction on the order from tens to hundreds of micrometers.
The foregoing LIGA method is known as a fine processing method, which allows processing on the order from tens to hundreds of micrometers in the depth direction.
In the LIGA method, however, it is
Minakuti Jun
Tabata Osamu
Yamamoto Koji
Gakkohojin Ritsumeikan
Garbowski Leigh M.
Lin Sun James
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