Triangle-based process hotspot classification with dummification in EUVL

As technology node advances, Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography (EUVL) is regarded as the most promising technology for improving the lithographic printability. However, there are still several challenges in EUVL like the most critical flare effect that causes patterning distortions. As a result, dummy fills are added to a layout (i.e., dummification) to compensate the flare effect. Although dummy fills are used to alleviate the flare effect, process hotspots still cannot be fully eliminated and are essential to be detected in the early design stages. Pattern matching is one of the most popular and widely-used technique to detect the process hotspots. However, existing pattern-matching-based algorithms may not effectively detect all process hotspots under the consideration of dummification. In this paper, we propose a two-stage triangle-based algorithm for process hotspot classification while considering the impact of dummification in EUVL. Experimental results show that our proposed algorithm is very effective and efficient compared with the state-of-the-art process hotspot classification algorithm.