Patent ID: 8841636

Claim:
A charged-particle multi-beamlet lithography system for transferring a pattern onto the surface of a target using a plurality of charged particle beamlets, the system comprising: a beam generator for generating a plurality of charged particle beamlets; a beamlet blanker array for patterning the plurality of beamlets in accordance with a pattern; wherein the beamlet blanker array comprises a plurality of modulators and a plurality of light sensitive elements, the light sensitive elements being arranged to receive pattern data carrying light beams and to convert the light beams into electrical signals, the light sensitive elements being electrically connected to one or more modulators for providing the received pattern data to the one or more modulators; a shielding structure of an electrically conductive material for substantially shielding electric fields generated in proximity to the light sensitive elements from the modulators, wherein the shielding structure is arranged to be set at a predetermined potential; and a projection system for projecting the patterned beamlets onto the target surface; wherein the beamlet blanker array comprises a substrate provided with a surface being subdivided into a plurality of alternating beam areas and non-beam areas, the modulators being located in the beam areas and each beam area comprising a plurality of modulators, and the light sensitive elements being located in the non-beam areas and each non-beam area comprising a plurality of light sensitive elements; and wherein the shielding structure is arranged to enclose the plurality of modulators in each beam area or the plurality of light sensitive elements in each non-beam area so that the projection of the shielding structure onto the beamlet blanker array forms a boundary between adjacent beam and non-beam areas to shield the modulators in the beam areas from electric fields generated in the non-beam areas.