Strange New Worlds: shaping the future of the digital age

Imagine a mirror the size of Germany with imperfections smaller than a human hair. This is the precision required to build the future of computing.

#1about 3 minutes

Moore's Law and the role of lithography in chip manufacturing

Moore's Law describes the exponential growth in transistor density, which is enabled by the core lithography process of creating and copying tiny structures.

#2about 2 minutes

A detailed overview of the chip manufacturing process

Microchips are created through a multi-layer process that starts with silicon from sand and involves polishing, photoresist application, etching, doping, and packaging.

#3about 7 minutes

Understanding the extreme precision required for projection optics

The projection optics used in lithography require picometer-level precision, an accuracy analogous to paving a 1000 km road with deviations smaller than a human hair.

#4about 3 minutes

How digital twins enable picometer-level precision

A digital twin simulates all physical effects like vibrations, plasma physics, and heat to isolate the desired signal and ensure the machine is designed, built, and calibrated correctly.

#5about 3 minutes

Integrating R&D and production with digital prototyping

System design, process development, and operations are tightly interconnected, relying on digital prototypes and simulations because physical hardware prototypes are no longer feasible.

#6about 4 minutes

The collaboration between physicists and software engineers

Physicists provide the domain knowledge for simulations, while research software engineers are needed to build a robust, adaptable, and domain-driven software ecosystem using tools like Python.

#7about 3 minutes

The evolution and future roadmap for lithography technology

Lithography machines have evolved from manually adjusted optical tools to complex, software-driven mechatronic systems, with the latest generation enabling a quantum leap in resolution.

#8about 6 minutes

Q&A on simulations and software developer collaboration

The ideal software developer is an architect who can build adaptable frameworks, as simulations must incorporate complex physics like plasma and gravity, but no prior optics knowledge is required.