There's a black hole inside me

Lithography machines are difficult.

It's really, really hard.

The difficulty factor is ten times that of the hydrogen bomb.

Even with all the efforts of the country, it is impossible to win it in the short term.

These are the words that often fill Wei Ming's ears, making him almost have calluses on his ears.

Is it really that difficult?

These days, I personally entered the R\u0026D factory and understood the working principle of the photolithography machine. In the "boss workshop", I used the little black in my body to easily polish dozens of qualified high-precision parts, as well as a 20-yuan "pot". "Lid" lens - Each "pot lid" lens is made of forty layers of glass, and the surface protrusions must not exceed 1 nanometer.

"It's very simple. It doesn't seem to be difficult."

Looking at the batches of parts with perfect accuracy in front of him, Wei Ming curled his lips and said.

"What's the problem?"

"Light generators are very difficult."

Pu Weicai said: "To create extreme ultraviolet light with a wavelength of 13.5 nanometers, we must use deep ultraviolet light with a wavelength of 193 nanometers to hit free-falling metal tin droplets, and we must hit two tin droplets continuously in a very short period of time. Repeated 50,000 times per second to produce extreme ultraviolet light of sufficient intensity.”

You must know that the diameter of metal tin droplets is only twenty microns.

During the free fall process, not only does it have to be hit by a laser, it must be flattened from a droplet shape into a round cake shape, and then hit a second time to emit the most intense extreme ultraviolet light... The entire process occurs completely dynamically. It's like hitting a fly with an embroidery needle, twice in a row.

And repeat this operation 50,000 times in one second.

"Didn't you say that the light source problem has been solved? And the energy utilization rate has reached 5%?" Wei Ming said in confusion.

"The light source has been solved because the impact light source we use is 132-nanometer light emitted by a special crystal. The energy utilization rate is definitely much higher than that of 193-nanometer light. However, if we want to produce extreme ultraviolet light with sufficient intensity at 13.5 nanometer wavelength, Light still has to be achieved by hitting tin drops, this is the only feasible way.”

"In other words, you only solved the problem of hitting the light source, and then you said you solved the light source...these two are not the same thing, right?"

Wei Ming frowned.

"Minister of Health, it's not that we like to engage in false propaganda, but if there are no results in long-term scientific research, who will pay attention to us, and how will the higher authorities provide us with funding? So even if it is just a partial breakthrough, we must focus on publicizing it."

Xiang Guanglin explained.

“The last technical problem we are overcoming is the frequency of tin droplets striking.”

Pu Weicai also said: "We have solved the problem of continuous hitting, but the maximum repetition rate is 5,000 times per second. However, our energy utilization rate is higher. We only need to repeat 20,000 times per second to have enough light intensity. ”

"So our energy utilization is not meaningless. 20,000 times per second is obviously much easier to achieve than 50,000 times per second."

"20,000 times per second..."

Wei Ming pondered for a moment and said, "What conditions are missing to prevent you from reaching this frequency?"

"Accuracy, the accuracy of the control system."

Pu Weicai said: "It's like a clock that accurately controls the free fall of 20,000 tin drops and 40,000 hits at the same time. In terms of time, the error per second must not exceed one billionth of a second; in terms of distance, every time Seconds cannot exceed 1 nanometer, and a 'bias correction' system must be designed. As long as the error accumulation is too large, it will be automatically corrected to allow the system to operate stably for a long time."

"Currently we are working hard to conquer the control system. The correction system is a little behind, but we have also arranged a team to tackle the problem."

"Of course, if the relevant parts imported from the island countries can be in our hands soon, we may be able to achieve a hitting frequency of more than 20,000 times within three months."

Island country?

Three months?

Wei Ming shook his head and smiled, and said: "If there are any missing parts, just leave them to me and I will fiddle with them for you."

Then he tinkered for three days straight.

Laser frequency controller.

Highly sensitive distance sensor.

There are also devices like this, devices like that, and things that Wei Ming cannot name by professional name.

He did a dozen in three days.

Then let Pu Weicai and others insert these devices into the control system and assemble them together with extremely high precision requirements.

The trial run was started again.

"Release the tin drops, the initial frequency is 1 drop per second." Pu Weicai gave the command.

"Start releasing."

"Two hits are successful, the flattening shape is perfect, and the stimulation effect is perfect!"

"Increase release frequency."

"50 successful trials per second."

"500 successful tests per second!"

"5150 tests per second were successful! Tying the highest record." The operator said with a slightly trembling voice.

"Keep increasing! Make it higher!"

Pu Weicai also started to get excited. This was just his first debugging, and it actually tied the previous record set by hundreds of debugging of parts?

"5500 tests per second were successful, setting a new record!"

"More!"

7000 per second

9000 per second

10,000 per second

…

Keep increasing to 20,000 per second to meet the frequency of use requirements.

Everyone was shocked to the point of numbness, but they still succeeded!

"Add more, add more!"

30,000 per second

40,000 per second

45,000 per second

50,000 per second!

"The tin droplet release frequency has reached the upper limit, and it still succeeded!" the operator shouted in an imageless manner.

"The converted light intensity is 2.5 times the rated light intensity!"

Xiang Guanglin shouted with red eyes: "This means that the efficiency of this photolithography machine in processing wafers is at least twice that of EsMed's EUV. One of ours can beat two of theirs!"

"Don't scream!"

Pu Weicai waved his hand high and stared at the data after the duration. He tried his best to suppress his emotions and said: "Look at 50,000 tin drops per second and 100,000 hits per second. How can this system work stably?" How long? Don't make any noise, your noise may affect its performance."

Everyone fell silent.

Hold your breath.

Their eyes were fixed on the duration.

5 minutes

15 minutes

29 minutes and 38 seconds

As the accumulated errors became larger and larger, there was no correction system to correct them, and the entire system finally stopped running automatically.

Snapped!

Pu Weicai hit his left palm hard with his right fist and said with a flushed face: "3 minutes is enough. As long as 3 minutes, there is no need to design a very complicated correction system. Unexpectedly, it lasted for half an hour! We We only need to design a very simple correction system to make it work stably for a long time. The complexity of the entire system is reduced by at least 10%, saving us a lot of time!”

"It's amazing, it's amazing!"

As the project leader, he himself exclaimed: "The light source problem has been completely solved, the duplex table is readily available, the lens is fully usable, and the completion rate of our EUV lithography machine is at least over 90%!"

"We fully see the hope of victory!"

As he spoke, he burst into tears and almost wanted to burst into tears.

Have persisted for more than ten years! This time, he really saw hope, right in front of him, already within reach.

Seeing him like this, other members of his team also wiped their eyes and made whining sounds.

"It's not really successful yet. It's better to save the tears for the celebration party."

A slightly disappointing voice came.

But I heard Wei Ming say: "Dr. Pu, you were still resisting just now, doubting that the things I polished could not be used. What now? Do you believe what I say? The parts problem is not a problem for our company. What do you think? It’s technically difficult, but it doesn’t feel too difficult.”

"That's right, that's right."

Pu Weicai quickly wiped his tears and showed a childlike smile: "Mr. Wei, you are right. As long as Mr. Wei takes action, there will be no difficulties with the photolithography machine. I believe that under the leadership of Mr. Wei, we can solve all technical problems!" "

This time he was truly convinced, with only admiration in his eyes.

"That's right, all thanks to Mr. Wei."

"Mr. Wei, thank you for your hard work. Give him a pat on the back."

"Mr. Wei's divine polishing can create industrial miracles!"

"Mr. Wei is the biggest contributor, thank you Mr. Wei."

Another wave of flattery came over me.

This time, Pu Weicai not only did not stop coughing, but was actually the one who took the most powerful shots.

Of course, just listening for a short while was enough. Wei Ming asked them to get into work immediately and continue to look for and solve problems until there were no more problems.

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