JMAR Wins Contracts for X-ray Lithography Support, Upgrade

SAN DIEGO, Nov. 19 -- JMAR Technologies Inc. said its JMAR/JSAL NanoLithography Inc. (JSAL) division in Burlington, Vt., has received a $1.2 million contract from a major New England-based aerospace firm to provide x-ray lithography (XRL) support services funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

The work involves collaboration with the research staff of the University of Vermont (UVM) to conduct semiconductor device demonstrations using point-source XRL technology.

JSAL will work with the UVM team to perform a series of tasks collectively called "mask magnification correction," a method for controlling X-ray mask magnification and demonstrating it on the manufacture of actual semiconductor devices.

The JMAR/JSAL division also received a purchase order for $1.7 million from the University of Wisconsin to upgrade one of JSAL's Model 4 x-ray lithography steppers currently installed at the university's Aladdin synchrotron at the Center for NanoTechnology in Stoughton, Wis. Under this order, the university's JSAL Model 4 stepper will be converted into a leading-edge JSAL Model 5C stepper for producing high-precision, multilayer sub-50 nanometer semiconductor microcircuits.

The stepper upgrade is part of a joint program by the University of Wisconsin's Center for NanoTechnology, with subcontracts to JMAR/SAL, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation of Japan (MELCO), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Louisiana State University (LSU) and the University of Vermont (UVM) to further substantiate the viability of the next generation of x-ray lithography for high-performance semiconductor processing applications.