Load balancing and optimization of distributed proximity effect correction on a temporally heterogeneous cluster

Grayscale electron-beam lithography is a technique widely used in transferring three-dimensional structures onto the resist layer or substrate. The proximity effect caused by electron scattering in the resist imposes a severe limitation on the ultimate spatial resolution attainable by e-beam lithography. Therefore, correction of the proximity effect is essential particularly for the fine-feature, high-density circuit patterns. However, the proximity effect correction is very time-consuming due to the intensive computation required in the correction procedure and a large size of circuit data to be processed. Hence, it is an ideal candidate for distributed computing where the otherwise-unused CPU cycles of a number of computers on a network (cluster) can be efficiently utilized. One of the characteristics of such a cluster is its heterogeneity, i.e., the available computing power varies with computer and/or time. This variation may degrade the performance of distributed computing significantly. In this paper, efficient distributed implementations of grayscale proximity effect correction on a temporally heterogeneous cluster are described with the main emphasis on static and dynamic load balancing schemes and their optimization through effective task partitioning methods. The experimental results obtained on a cluster of Sun workstations shared by multiple users are presented with detailed discussion.