The steady flying of a plasmonic flying head over a photoresist-coated surface in a near-field photolithography system. (24th March 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Ji, Jiaxin; Hu, Yueqiang; Meng, Yonggang; Zhang, Jun; Xu, Jian; Li, Shayu; Yang, Guoqiang
• Is Part Of: Nanotechnology. Volume 27:Number 18(2016)
• Publication Date: 2016-03-24
• Subjects: NFPT -- plasmonic lens -- molecular glass photoresist -- molecular gas lubrication; Nanotechnology -- Periodicals; Nanotechnology -- Periodicals; Nanotechnology; Publications périodiques; Nanotechnologies; Periodicals; 620.5
• DOI: 10.1088/0957-4484/27/18/185303
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0957-4484

Abstract

Abstract: The near-field photolithography technique (NFPT) offers a new approach of nanolithography for a dramatic increase in the resolution with high throughput and low cost. The NFPT utilizes the same flight principle as that of the magnetic head of hard-disk drives but replacing the magnetic head with a plasmonic flying head. The plasmonic flying head, which can focus the incident laser beam to a spot size of sub-20 nm with an enhanced field intensity by exciting surface plasmon polaritons, takes off and then flies steadily above the revolving disk coated by a photoresist film to be patterned with a narrow gap of tens of nanometers. As a key foundation of the NFPT, the take off and flight stability of the plasmonic flying head affects the pattern density and the fabrication efficiency. This work proposed and investigated a molecular glass photoresist, named FPT-8Boc, for the large-scale consistent fabrication with the NFPT. To overcome the take-off problem of the head over the soft photoresist film, a transition zone is intentionally formed by washing off the coated photoresist in the outer area of the disk using a solvent. The simulation results by COMSOL Multiphysics software and quasi-Newton iteration method review that the matched transition zone height with spreading length can guarantee the flight stability of the plasmonic flying head on the soft photoresist. Using this method, a preliminary photolithography result with a 31 nm line width has been achieved.