Beam pen lithography

Abstract

Lithography techniques are currently being developed to fabricate nanoscale components for integrated circuits, medical diagnostics and optoelectronics. In conventional far-field optical lithography, lateral feature resolution is diffraction-limited. Approaches that overcome the diffraction limit have been developed, but these are difficult to implement or they preclude arbitrary pattern formation. Techniques based on near-field scanning optical microscopy can overcome the diffraction limit, but they suffer from inherently low throughput and restricted scan areas. Highly parallel two-dimensional, silicon-based, near-field scanning optical microscopy aperture arrays have been fabricated, but aligning a non-deformable aperture array to a large-area substrate with near-field proximity remains challenging. However, recent advances in lithographies based on scanning probe microscopy have made use of transparent two-dimensional arrays of pyramid-shaped elastomeric tips (or 'pens') for large-area, high-throughput patterning of ink molecules. Here, we report a massively parallel scanning probe microscopy-based approach that can generate arbitrary patterns by passing 400-nm light through nanoscopic apertures at each tip in the array. The technique, termed beam pen lithography, can toggle between near- and far-field distances, allowing both sub-diffraction limit (100 nm) and larger features to be generated.

Microcup Arrays Featuring Multiple Chemical Regions Patterned with Nanoscale Precision

“…[1][2][3] Considerable improvements in the methodologies for micro-and nanoscale surface patterning have occurred recently, as highlighted in a number of topical reviews on the different fabrication techniques. [4][5][6][7] Some of the notable examples include dip pen nanolithography (DPN), [ 8 ] polymer pen lithography (PPL), [ 9 ] beam pen lithography (BPL), [ 10 ] electron beam lithography, [ 11 ] photolithography, [ 12 ] inkjet printing, [ 13 ] and soft-lithography-based techniques. [ 14 ] These techniques can position single and multiple chemical and biological moieties in micrometer to nanometer features with extreme accuracy.…”

Reverse-absorbance-modulation-optical lithography for optical nanopatterning at low light levels

“…[1][2][3][4][5] The diffraction limit 6 associated with all optical systems, has been circumvented by a number of techniques like self-aligned patterning techniques, 7,8 multiple exposure-and-etch mechanisms 9 and a number of other near-field methods [10][11][12][13] that have been inspired by techniques of super-resolution nanoscopy like stimulated-emission-depletion (STED).…”

Improving coupling efficiency of tapered metallic gaps using spatial amplitude modulation

“…Related technologies have been widely applied in super-resolution optical imaging, 1 optical sensing, 2 optical trapping and manipulation of particles, 3 optical interconnection, 4 highdensity optical storage, 5 nanolithography, 6 solar energy utilization, 7 local nonlinearity, 8 and so on. An evanescent decay method based on a tapered metallic waveguide is most commonly adopted for this end.…”