Sunday, March 18, 2012

High Aspect Subdiffraction-Limit Photolithography via a Silver Superlens


Hong Liu, Bing Wang, Lin Ke, Jie Deng, Chan Choy Chum, Siew Lang Teo, Lu Shen, Stefan A. Maier*, and Jinghua Teng*
 Institute of Materials Research and Engineering,Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), 3 Research Link, Singapore 117602
 Department of Physics, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom
Nano Lett.201212 (3), pp 1549–1554
DOI: 10.1021/nl2044088
Publication Date (Web): February 29, 2012
Copyright © 2012 American Chemical Society

Photolithography is the technology of choice for mass patterning in semiconductor and data storage industries. Superlenses have demonstrated the capability of subdiffraction-limit imaging and been envisioned as a promising technology for potential nanophotolithography. Unfortunately, subdiffraction-limit patterns generated by current superlenses exhibited poor profile depth far below the requirement for photolithography. Here, we report an experimental demonstration of sub-50 nm resolution nanophotolithography via a smooth silver superlens with a high aspect profile of 45 nm, as well as grayscale subdiffraction-limit three-dimensional nanopatterning. Theoretical analysis and simulation show that smooth interfaces play a critical role. Superlens-based lithography can be integrated with conventional UV photolithography systems to endow them with the capability of nanophotolithography, which could provide a cost-effective approach for large scale and rapid nanopatterning.

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