Patent ID: 8381141
Filing Date: 2013-02-19
Classification: G03F

Abstract:
1. A method of printing a lithographic pattern on a substrate comprising: providing at least one simulated lithographic pattern, wherein each of said at least one simulated lithographic pattern is generated employing a set of lithographic processing conditions and data preparation parameters; identifying a set of optical rule checker (ORC) markers in each of said at least one simulated lithographic pattern, wherein each of said ORC markers includes a region of said at least one simulated lithographic pattern that includes a dimension less than a minimum dimension in rule of an optical rule checker; generating a minimum dimension region around each of said set of ORC markers, wherein each minimum dimension region has said minimum dimension throughout an entirety of a length thereof; generating a failure region around each of said set of ORC markers by subtracting areas of line patterns or space patterns from each of said minimum dimension regions; generating a figure of demerit by adding all areas of said failure regions for each of said at least one simulated lithographic pattern; and printing a lithographic pattern on a substrate employing one of said at least one simulated lithographic pattern by selecting a simulated lithographic pattern having a least figure of demerit among said at least one figure of demerit or after verifying that a figure of demerit of a selected simulated lithographic pattern is less than a predefined criterion.