Simulation of a discharge produced plasma (DPP) for Blue-X (6.x nm) EUV radiation

The EQ-10 Electrodeless Z-pinchTM source uses Xenon plasma to produce 13.5 nm (±1% BW) radiation. The source is used for metrology, mask inspection, and resist development. In this talk we will present modeling of the EQ-10 Z-pinch using the Trac-II radiation magnetohydrodynamic (RMHD) code. Specifically, we use RMHD calculations to explore development of the Electrodeless Z-pinch as a source of Blue-X (6.x nm) radiation. Critical to this study are the nonLTE effects on radiation physics and the equation of state. For this we rely on the FLYCHK collisional-radiative model to determine the radiative power loss. We also use the FLYCHK calculated emissivity to estimate the Blue-X power output. We revisit previous experimental attempts at obtaining Blue-X EUV radiation with neon gas. Having established a baseline of performance on our present Z-pinch system, we use RMHD calculations to scale to higher outputs of potential interest to the EUV community.