Patent ID: 8027813

Claim:
A method of calculating estimated image profiles implemented on a tangibly-embodied storage medium resident on one or more computing devices, comprising the steps of: providing imaging configuration characteristic data; performing simulation calculations for various levels for each aberration component using the imaging configuration characteristic data using a processor of the one or more computing devices; building response surface functional relations using the processor of the one or more computing devices between variables of lens characteristics and an image profile of interest using the simulation calculations; and evaluating specified aberration values of a lens in relation to the response surface functional relations using the processor of the one or more computing devices to provide an estimate of the image profile in a presence of specified aberration(s), wherein the building steps includes: providing an order fitting function expressed as: I spx ( x )= b 0 +b 1 x+b 2 x 2 +b 3 x 3 +. . . .+b n x n where I spx is aerial image intensity or amplitude at a simulation pixel (spx) and x indicates defocus; and expressing a change of the coefficients b 0 . . . b n described by an order fitting function expressed as: b i ⁡ ( with ⁢ _ ⁢ aberration ) = ⁢ b i ⁡ ( w / o ⁢ _ ⁢ aberration ) + ∑ j = 2 Zn ⁢ ⁢ Δ ⁢ ⁢ b i ⁡ ( cj ) = ⁢ b i ⁡ ( w / o ⁢ _ ⁢ aberration ) + ∑ j = 2 Zn ⁢ ⁢ φ 0 ⁢ ( i , j ) + φ 1 ⁢ ( i , j ) ⁢ c j + φ 2 ( i , j ) ⁢ c j 2 + ⁢ φ 3 ⁢ ( i , j ) ⁢ c j 3 + … + φ n ⁡ ( i , j ) ⁢ c j n wherein =0, 1, 2, 3, . . . . , n; b i(with aberration) and b i(w/o aberration) represents one of the coefficients b 0 . . . b n influenced by lens aberrations and the coefficients b 0 . . . b n without aberrations, respectively, and Δbi indicates the change in coefficients and is expressed by an n th order fitting function of jth Zernike coefficient c j , φ 0(ij) . . . φ n(ij) are the coefficients of the fitting function, determined following the performing step of setup simulations of image profile as a function of regularly iterated values of lens aberration.