Patent ID: 8921758

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, the beamlet blanker array comprising a substrate provided with a first area comprising one or more modulators for modulating the beamlets on the basis of pattern data related to the pattern to be formed onto the surface and a second area free of modulators and comprising one or more light sensitive elements, the one or more light sensitive elements being electrically connected to the one or more modulators and being arranged to receive light beams carrying the pattern data and to provide the received pattern data to the one or more modulators; an optical fiber arrangement for guiding the light beams carrying the pattern data, during operation of the lithography system, towards the one or more light sensitive elements, the optical fiber arrangement comprising a plurality of optical fibers; and a projection system for projecting the patterned beamlets onto the target surface; wherein a projection of the optical fibers in the optical fiber arrangement in a direction perpendicular to the beamlet blanker array surface falls entirely within the second area.