The thing I didn't understand after watching that video was why you need such an exotic solution to produce EUV light. We can make lights no problem in the visible spectrum, we can make xray machines easily enough that every doctors office can afford one, what is it specifically about those wavelengths that are so tricky.
It really is the specific wavelength. Higher or lower is easier. But euv has tricky properties which make it feasible for Lithography (although just barely it you have a look at the optics) but hard to produce with high intensities.
The whole “exploding tiny drops of metal” in the middle of this is just Loony Toons. This machine is literally insane and two of the companies I am long-long on would be completely fucked without it.
Yes it was crazy when I first heard about it "wait what? they shoot it in mid-air?" and that was before I found out they did that like 30k times a second.
But now 100k times a second apparently. Humans are amazing.
You have a machine that’s basically a clean room inside and one of the parts is essentially electrosputtering tin but then throwing all the tin away and using the EM pulse from the sputter to do work.
Oh and can you build it so it can run hundreds or thousands of hours before being cleaned? Thanks byyyyyyyyeeeeee!
> The key advancements in Monday's disclosure involved doubling the number of tin drops to about 100,000 every second, and shaping them into plasma using two smaller laser bursts, as opposed to today's machines that use a single shaping burst.
This is covered in that video. Did they let him leak their Q1 plans?
So how small are individual components (e.g., transistors) nowadays? Presumably there's a lower limit: once you're a few atoms across, it seems that you can't go any smaller (?).
Yeah it's an interesting angle in the article. The EUV light source technology is completely designed, developed, and manufactured by Cymer in California, which is a US company that ASML acquired in 2013. If export control agreements were not in place then ASML would have never been permitted to acquire Cymer. And if they are not enforced then the US would almost certainly require ASML to sell Cymer back to US ownership, TikTok-style.
The reality is that it's American technology that is used in ASML machines so I don't know why the article tries to frame it like it's a competition.
xLight is the promising new US competitor to Cymer. Lots of funding from the US CHIPS And Science Act. Founded by Dept. of Energy engineers who formerly worked on large-scale X-Ray systems and particle accelerators.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiUHjLxm3V0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2482h_TNwg
Or this presentation which came out way long ago.
But now 100k times a second apparently. Humans are amazing.
< Why?!
> To make a better laser.
< Yes, of course you are.
> 100,000 times per second.
< [AFK, buying shares.]
We are quickly leaving the realm of dependent variables still looking anything like diversification.
Oh and can you build it so it can run hundreds or thousands of hours before being cleaned? Thanks byyyyyyyyeeeeee!
> The key advancements in Monday's disclosure involved doubling the number of tin drops to about 100,000 every second, and shaping them into plasma using two smaller laser bursts, as opposed to today's machines that use a single shaping burst.
This is covered in that video. Did they let him leak their Q1 plans?
> "We see a reasonably clear path toward 1,500 watts, and no fundamental reason why we couldn't get to 2,000 watts."
> to help retain the Dutch company's edge over emerging U.S. and Chinese rivals
Great news, but what a strange attempt to equate the U.S. and China in this and build a narrative. Cymer was founded in San Diego.
The reality is that it's American technology that is used in ASML machines so I don't know why the article tries to frame it like it's a competition.