Nanopatterning on silicon wafers using AFM-based lithography--for solar cells

In this report, the nanopatterning method based on atomic force microscopy (AFM) with electrical bias to form the oxide patterns on silicon wafer is described. Under constant bias, 30 V, the linear pattern size is proportional to the rising humidity in the working environment. According to our experimental results, the sizes of the most circular nanopatterns are in the range from 50 nm to 70 nm depending on the applied bias and interaction time. In the results of evaluating the generation of oxidative production, the diameters and the number of oxide two dimensional nanopattern array, defaulted to 25 dots in 1 microm2, appeared in the AFM images have increasing tendency with the larger bias and the longer dwell time. Moreover, the imaging features of nanopatterns caused by bias 30 V have better performance than those by 10 V, and the dwell time only takes 0.015 s per dot.