Above the FIB, the wafer passes over another set of fingers suspended at the end of a long arm. This arm is raised, lifting the wafer off of the spatula. The spatula moves aside and the wafer is lowered onto the FIB.
The FIB is designed to write a pattern with features as small as 300 atoms across. However, the pumps on the main MBE system cause it to vibrate over much larger distances. The FIB is therefore anchored on massive steel legs to the basement floor. It is then connected to the MBE system only via thin bellows (the zig-zag tube). Thus, the parts tinted blue, should be largely free of vibration.
