Hi
Studying electrical engineering i had the chance to go through the whole manufacturing process for 4µm gate length SOI nmos and pmos devices in a guided weekly lab course. It has been about two years since i was active in the lab, but i have some understanding of the general processes: standard clean, dry and wet etching, lithography with positive and negative processes, growing oxide... the bottom line is, i understand most of it but never worked in industry, or using cutting edge tools. And I am 99% sure RWTH's lab does not have a stepper. We used visible/near UV contact lithography in that course.
Sounds already good alright.
If I understand correctly, you plan to use double patterning to make 1µm work on a regular projector's pixel grid and a condenser optics?
For 1µm we might actually still fly ok with normal exposure using a projector but for higher resolutions we will have to use double patterning because you can only reduce so far with a lens system.
I guess that is both a very ambitious but at the same time very tempting project. Looking forward to seeing self-made litho steppers pop up in hackspaces ;D
Exactly. Yes. We can use a DMD[1] which already can go down to 500nm, as I've seen recently[2], assuming, we get the lens system right.
I guess I could best help with electronics and control programming, since that is an area i have some practical experience (microcontrollers as well as desktop). But not nearly as much as most people you'd meet at CCC -- i just think this is a very interesting project and i have some shallow understanding of almost all the puzzle pieces involved.
I've checked on AliExpress and there are plenty of inexpensive DMD chips available for sale. One of those in combination with a good lens system and positioning system, might actually do the trick.
-lev
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_micromirror_device [2] https://www.nanosystem-solutions.com/en/product/maskless