ALEXANDRIA, Va., Jan. 28 -- United States Patent no. 12,535,729, issued on Jan. 27, was assigned to Carl Zeiss SMT GmbH (Oberkochen, Germany).
"Method and apparatus for mask repair" was invented by Daniel Rhinow (Frankfurt am Main, Germany), Christian Felix Hermanns (Frankfurt am Main, Germany), Johann-Christoph Von Saldern (Jena, Germany), Hubertus Marbach (Grossostheim, Germany), Nicole Auth (Ginsheim-Gustavsburg, Germany), Bartholomaeus Szafranek (Ober-Ramstadt, Germany) and Christian Preischl (Mainz, Germany).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "The present invention pertains to methods, apparatuses and computer programs for processing an object for lithography. A method for processing an object...