ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 12 -- United States Patent no. 12,249,482, issued on March 11, was assigned to FEI Co. (Hillsboro, Ore.).
"Microscopy feedback for improved milling accuracy" was invented by Thomas Gary Miller (Portland, Ore.), Jason Arjavac (Hillsboro, Ore.), Brian Routh Jr. (Beaverton, Ore.) and Mark Biedrzycki (Beaverton, Ore.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Methods and apparatus are disclosed for integration of image-based metrology into a milling workflow. A first ion beam milling operation is performed to an edge at a distance from a final target position on a sample. An SEM image of the sample is used to determine a distance between the milled edge and a reference structure on the...