High-quality Blazed Gratings through Synergy between E-Beam lithography and Robust Characterisation Techniques
Published: Jul 30, 2025
Last Updated: Jul 30, 2025
Authors:Analía F. Herrero, Nazanin Samadi, Andrey Sokolov, Grzegorz Gwalt, Stefan Rehbein, Anke Teichert, Bas Ketelaars, Christian Zonnevylle, Thomas Krist, Christian David, Frank Siewert
Abstract
Maintaining the highest quality and output of photon science in the VUV-, EUV-, soft- and tender-X-ray energy ranges requires high-quality blazed profile gratings. Currently, their availability is critical due to technological challenges and limited manufacturing resources. In this work we discuss the opportunity of an alternative method to manufacture blazed gratings by means of electron-beam lithography (EBL). We investigate the different parameters influencing the optical performance of blazed profile gratings produced by EBL and develop a robust process for the manufacturing of high-quality blazed gratings using polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) as high resolution, positive tone resist and ion beam etching.