Ice Lithography at MU - Current and Future Directions

Abstract: Ice Lithography (IL) is a new technique for electron beam lithography that employs conformal ices (i.e., solid phase condensed gasses) as sacrificial resist layers for lithographic processes on a variety of sample types. The completely dry in-situ processing inherent in IL allows for high precision patterning of delicate and organic surfaces such as atomic force microscope (AFM) tips and proteins. In this talk I will present an overview of the capabilities of the MU IL instrument and describe our recent work, which is centered on pushing ice species beyond water. Amorphous H₂O ice is a material that has been well characterized in the astrophysics community but has received little attention from the nanotechnology field. It is a positive resist that requires large critical doses (about 2C/cm^2 for 200nm thick ice). The alcohols (ethanol, methanol and isopropanol) are attractive candidates to complement water ice. They are negative phase resists which exhibit lower critical dose (0.2C/cm^2 for 200nm thick ice) requirements than water ice. We are exploring the use of alcohol resists in conjunction with Reactive Ion Etching (RIE) for accurate modification of small, delicate, structures such as AFM tips. We are also interested in characterizing the residual material from alcohol ices after exposure to the electron beam which can be achieved through several methods including Electron Energy Loss Spectroscopy (EELS) and simulations such as the high energy chemistry program GEANT-4.