172: Chapter 172 Multi-Atom Parallel Deposition: Countdown to Dry Dock Topping-Out!

Alien civilization voyage timing, Day 57.

Pangu Laboratory, Level B2, 9:00 AM.

Zhao Mingyuan hooked a swivel chair over with his foot and pushed the screens of two terminals together.

The left screen ran the underlying kinematics planning for the deposition path, while the right screen displayed the upper-level scheduling interface framework that Su Che had just pushed over.

The data structures of the two pieces of code did not match.

Zhao Mingyuan's underlying layer used a polar coordinate system, while Su Che's upper layer used Cartesian rectangular coordinates.

"Does your scheduling interface take Cartesian coordinates?" Zhao Mingyuan turned his head.

Su Che was adjusting the thermal compensation parameters for the third mirror in the optical path design simulation space and did not turn around.

"Change yours."

"Why should I?"

"Because grid slicing for spatial allocation in multi-atomic parallel deposition is more convenient with Cartesian coordinates than polar coordinates." Su Che threw a piece of pseudo-code for grid partitioning into the public repository. "See for yourself."

Zhao Mingyuan pulled it over and looked at it for thirty seconds.

He didn't say another word and buried his head in changing the coordinate system.

Multi-atomic parallel deposition is the watershed moment for whether the Sub-nanometer lithography all-in-one machine can be practical.

Depositing atoms one by one would take hundreds of years to make a palm-sized chip.

Only by manipulating dozens or even hundreds of atoms simultaneously for parallel deposition can the time be compressed to an engineeringly acceptable range.

The difficulty lies in isolation.

When dozens of atoms are clamped by quantum fields simultaneously, their quantum states will crosstalk with each other.

The wave function collapse of atom A affects the positioning accuracy of atom B, and the deviation of B in turn interferes with C.

The many-body quantum problem is a notoriously tough nut to crack in physics.

After spending two days unifying the coordinate systems, Zhao Mingyuan began to tackle this crosstalk isolation.

He tried three schemes.

The first, spatial isolation—increasing the distance between atoms so that the effective ranges of the quantum fields do not overlap. It was effective, but once the distance increased, the number of parallel depositions couldn't be increased.

The second, temporal isolation—staggering the deposition time windows so that adjacent atoms do not land within the same femtosecond. Crosstalk was reduced, but the scheduling complexity exploded exponentially.

The third, frequency-domain isolation—assigning quantum field clamping signals of different frequencies to different atoms.

Zhao Mingyuan ran a round of frequency-domain isolation tests in the simulation space of the Mirror World.

Sixteen virtual silicon atoms were simultaneously clamped by sixteen sets of quantum fields with different frequencies, separated from the beam, and flew toward the substrate along their respective trajectories.

The landing deviation was 4.9 picometers on average, even lower than the 5.63 of a single atom.

"Frequency-domain isolation inherently brings noise reduction effects." Zhao Mingyuan pushed the test report to Su Che. "The clamping fields of different frequencies are orthogonal to each other, and the crosstalk terms automatically zero out in the integration."

Su Che flipped to the spectrum diagram on the third page of the report and scanned it for ten seconds.

"Expand it to sixty-four."

Zhao Mingyuan did not hesitate; he changed the parameters and re-ran it.

Sixty-four atoms.

The landing deviation was 5.1 picometers on average.

It rose slightly but was still within the compensation range of the dynamic calibration.

"With sixty-four atoms in parallel, the single-layer deposition speed is increased sixty-four times." Zhao Mingyuan leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on the edge of the console. "This number is enough."

Su Che performed a quick integration test between the frequency-domain isolation scheme and his upper-level scheduling interface.

The data flow was smooth, with no blockages.

"Deposition layout finalized, push to the encrypted repository."

Both lines were locked down simultaneously.

Underlying architecture, compensation algorithms, optical path design, and deposition layout.

The four core code modules of the Sub-nanometer lithography all-in-one machine were all in place.

What remained was system integration and debugging.

As well as that quantum ultimate isolation medium that hadn't been redeemed yet.

...

Alien civilization voyage timing, Day 59.

East side of Level B2, U-shaped array area.

Wen Bo slapped the accelerated aging test report of the second version of the composite thermal insulation layer in front of Liu Huaqiang.

"Zirconium carbide inner layer plus aluminum oxide fiber felt outer layer, with the interface bonded by plasma spraying."

He pointed to the thermal cycle curve in the report with his enamel mug. "After two thousand alternating cycles of the 300-degree temperature difference between day and night on the lunar surface, there was no delamination at the interface, and the thermal conductivity remained stable at 0.03 W/m·K."

"How much better is it than the first version?" Liu Huaqiang took the mechanical pencil from his ear and wrote a question mark on the blank space of the report.

"The thermal conductivity dropped by an order of magnitude, and the lifespan doubled." Wen Bo squatted down and placed the enamel mug on the ground. "It's enough for twenty years on the moon."

Academician Li Zhengyang handed over a piece of paper from the folding table.

"The selection of the high-precision temperature measurement sensors is confirmed." He placed the paper on top of the report. "Dual redundancy with platinum resistance and quantum thermometers, measurement accuracy of 0.001 Kelvin, and a response time of 5 milliseconds."

Liu Huaqiang took the paper and scanned it, then drew a checkmark on the last line of the selection table with his pencil.

"I locked the temperature control algorithm last night; it's a PID three-loop nested system with fuzzy self-adaptation. I ran 1,200 sets of extreme condition simulations, and all were within the safety envelope."

Three and a half days.

Thermal insulation materials, control algorithms, and sensor selection—all three lines were wrapped up simultaneously.

Su Che walked over from the main console, took the test report from Wen Bo and the selection table from Academician Li Zhengyang, and flipped through them.

"Temperature control module finished."

A mechanical voice sounded in his mind.

[Ding! Lunar side mission "Don't let the furnace on the moon run hot and cold!" completed!]

[Full system verification of the improved lunar fusion reactor temperature control module passed! The composite thermal insulation layer showed no abnormalities after 2,000 cycles of extreme lunar surface temperature differences, temperature control accuracy reached 0.001 K, and all 1,200 sets of algorithm simulations passed!]

[Mission Reward: 60,000 Skill Points!]

Immediately after—

[Ding! Detected a gap in construction material demand at the Lunar Development Base, lunar side mission triggered!]

[Mission Name: Turn lunar soil into bricks!]

[Mission Content: There are no brick factories on the moon, but there are treasures under your feet! Please develop a lunar soil resource processing system to realize lunar basalt melting separation, Helium-3 associated resource extraction, and lunar soil lightweight enhancement, turning the gray soil underfoot into building materials for houses!]

[Mission Reward: 120,000 Skill Points, unlocking redemption rights for lunar basalt melting separation technology, Helium-3 associated resource extraction technology, lunar soil lightweight enhancement technology, and in-situ resource conversion technology, requiring 60,000 redemption points.]

[Current host independent point balance is sufficient, redeem?]

"Redeem."

[Ding! Consumed 60,000 independent points, core technologies unlocked!]

[System Prompt: Supporting auxiliary technologies have not been redeemed, including: Lunar soil processing assembly line blueprints (5,000 redemption points), microwave melting reaction module design (4,000 redemption points), soil composition rapid analysis chip (3,000 redemption points), resource conversion scheme (3,000 redemption points), total redemption points: 15,000.]

"Redeem all."

[Ding! Consumed 15,000 independent points.]

Su Che closed the panel and turned to Liu Huaqiang.

"The third item for lunar development, the soil resource processing system; let's divide the work."

Liu Huaqiang took the pencil from his ear and wrote the project name on the whiteboard.

"Wen Bo, you take on the microwave melting technology breakthrough." He drew an arrow pointing to the materials area. "The Helium-3 associated resource extraction will be an extension of the Helium-3 separation module at the energy station; I will lead the team to handle it."

"I'll calculate the thermodynamic phase diagram of the lunar soil composition." Academician Li Zhengyang picked up his thermos and stood up.

"You don't need to calculate it." Wen Bo picked up the enamel mug from the ground. "It's all in the database of lunar soil samples brought back by Apollo, and the samples collected by the Dragon Kingdom's Chang'e series are even more accurate; we can just call them directly."

"Then what do I do?"

"Help me verify the matching relationship between the microwave frequency and the dielectric constant of the lunar soil." Wen Bo was already walking toward the materials area.

Academician Li Zhengyang followed him, habitually pressing the latch on his thermos.

Click.

...

Alien civilization voyage timing, Day 62.

Pangu Laboratory, Level B2.

Su Che sat in front of the main console, with the system integration module for the Sub-nanometer lithography all-in-one machine open on the screen.

The interfaces of the four major code blocks were all aligned, and the joint debugging script was half written.

His handheld device received three messages at once.

The first one was from Zhou Dehai at Kaitian Base.

"The Zhulong Production Line has completed the processing of the seventh batch of structural components for the 100,000-ton class luan bird this week. The beryllium-copper alloy vacuum chamber for the lunar energy station has passed the factory quality inspection and has been loaded and shipped to Jiuquan Launch Base."

The second one was from Academician Sun Qiwen at Jiuquan Launch Base.

"The luan bird verification ship has delivered 18,000 tons of components to near-Earth orbit this week. The third lens substrate has finished polishing and is being shipped to Pangu Laboratory."

The third one was from Lieutenant General Peng Zhenbang's dedicated line.

"Chief Engineer Su." Lieutenant General Peng Zhenbang's voice was very restrained. "The outer shell of the Dry Dock enclosed assembly cabin..."

The image cut to the center of the monitoring wall.

At an altitude of 400 kilometers, the last dark gray thermal insulation panel was pushed into the designated slot from both sides by two infrastructure robots.

The plasma welding torches ignited simultaneously, a white light flashed, and the gap disappeared.

That super artificial structure, over two thousand meters in diameter, was completely closed from base to top, from keel to outer shell.

A complete space factory was suspended in Earth's orbit.

"...Topping out complete."

Su Che stared at the screen for three seconds.

The final assembly workshop for the 100,000-ton class luan bird was ready.

The on-orbit manufacturing of the Sub-nanometer lithography all-in-one machine also had a venue.

He turned off the communication and his gaze fell back on the half-written joint debugging script on the screen.

Five more days.

System integration and final debugging of the lithography all-in-one machine, five days.

On the desk beside him, three polished lens substrates were neatly arranged in an anti-static box.

The remaining nine were still being ground on equipment at the Changchun Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics and in Chengdu.

Su Che set the cursor of the joint debugging script to the next line.

The handheld device in his pocket vibrated again.

A message from Jiang Yingxue.

"The channels for the three Middle Eastern countries were opened this week, and the cumulative global shipments of Star Sea Glasses have reached 1.4 billion pairs."

Su Che did not reply to the message.

He placed his phone face down on the desk and pulled over the keyboard.

The Dry Dock had been topped out.

The frame of the luan bird was about to start being filled in.

And before that, he had to move a machine that could build Sub-nanometer chips up into the sky.