US Patent Issued to Applied Materials on Jan. 20 for "Methods of modifying openings in hardmasks and photoresists to achieve desired critical dimensions" (Massachusetts Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Jan. 20 -- United States Patent no. 12,529,135, issued on Jan. 20, was assigned to Applied Materials Inc. (Santa Clara, Calif.).

"Methods of modifying openings in hardmasks and photoresists to achieve desired critical dimensions" was invented by Charith Nanayakkara (Gloucester, Mass.) and John Hautala (Beverly, Mass.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A method of modifying an opening in a mask to achieve desired critical dimensions, the method including performing a pre-implant on the mask to implant the mask with a dopant material, wherein a material of the mask is densified and the opening is enlarged, directing a first radical beam at a first lateral side of the opening to dep...