ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 16 -- United States Patent no. 12,306,539, issued on May 20, was assigned to CARL ZEISS SMT GMBH (Oberkochen, Germany).
"Optical element, EUV lithography system, and method for forming nanoparticles" was invented by Anastasia Gonchar (Ulm, Germany).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "An optical element (1) includes: a substrate (2), applied to the substrate (2), a multilayer system (3) which reflects EUV radiation (4), and applied to the multilayer system (3), a protective layer system (5) having an uppermost layer (5a). Nanoparticles (7) are embedded into the material of the uppermost layer (5a) of the protective layer system (5) which nanoparticles contain at least one metal...