Wafer-scale fabrication of high-aspect ratio nanochannels based on edge-lithography technique

Abstract

This paper introduced a wafer-scale fabrication approach for the preparation of nanochannels with high-aspect ratio (the ratio of the channel depth to its width). Edge lithography was used to pattern nanogaps in an aluminum film, which was functioned as deep reactive ion etching mask thereafter to form the nanochannel. Nanochannels with aspect ratio up to 172 and width down to 44 nm were successfully fabricated on a 4-inch Si wafer with width nonuniformity less than 13.6%. A microfluidic chip integrated with nanometer-sized filters was successfully fabricated by utilizing the present method for geometric-controllable nanoparticle packing.

Fabrication and characterization of sub-100/10 nm planar nanofluidic channels by triple thermal oxidation and silicon-glass anodic bonding

“…But these methods met the requirements of most nanofluidic studies, which only need one nano-confined dimension to realize electrical double layer overlapping. Xie et al 10 proposed edge lithography as a wafer-scale scheme of fabricating vertical nanochannels from 500 nm down to 50 nm. By controlling the process recipe, several groups adopted Reactive Ion Etching (RIE) to fabricate planar nanofluidic channels with depth down to 20 nm.…”

Nanostructured 2D cellular materials in silicon by sidewall transfer lithography NEMS

“…In this paper we demonstrate 2D nanostructured materials that can be integrated directly into silicon NEMS using a parallel fabrication process, sidewall transfer lithography (STL). STL was developed to overcome resolution limits in microelectronics [48,49], but has since been modified to fabricate optics [50,51], field emission devices [52], nanowires [53,54], nanoimprint templates [55,56], photomasks [57] and nanochannels [58]. We ourselves have used it to fabricate single crystal NEMS [59,60], by DRIE of bonded siliconon-insulator (BSOI) [61,62].…”

Nanoporous morphology control of polyethylene membranes by block copolymer blends

“…Recently, nanoporous membranes have received much attention in biological applications, including biosensors, [1][2][3][4][5] tissue engineering, 6 lab-on-a-chip, 7 drug delivery, 8,9 molecular separation, [10][11][12][13] and sieves. 14 A typical example is an anodic aluminium oxide membrane.…”