Fighting dust in a research lab where almost everyone smoked

Chip lithography is all about productivity and precision. But there’s also a third, equally important parameter. One that hardly reaches the public eye, but that’s at least as critical to system architects of a wafer scanner: cleanliness.

Chip production is a continuous effort to reduce particles. ICs in the making are vulnerable. They spend months in a waferfab before they’re ready. One hit by a single dust particle and the whole chip is wasted. That battle against dust began in the 1960s and has resulted in the cleanest environments on Earth – wafer fabs. Today, they consist of huge spaces that are significantly cleaner than any food production plant or surgery room.