Charge dissipation in e-beam lithography with Novolak-based conducting polymer films

Charging of common resist materials during electron beam (e-beam) writing leads to deflection of the electron beam path, which can result in significant pattern displacement. Here we report a new conducting polymer to eliminate charging. A common approach is to place the conducting layer underneath the e-beam resist layer. Conductivity equal or greater than 10(-4) S cm(-1) has been reported to prevent pattern displacement. Some other properties such as a flat surface layer, chemical inertness and insolubility in both the top resist solvent and the developer are also necessary. The way to achieve all these properties consisted in synthesizing a conducting polymer inside an insulating polymer to form an interpenetrating polymer network (IPN) which could combine their properties. Novolak was used as the host polymer and terthiophene (3T) as the monomer to polymerize. Cu(ClO(4))(2) initiates simultaneously the oxidative polymerization of the 3T and its subsequent doping inside Novolak during the bake step in a one-step reaction. Solvent-resistant and homogeneous conducting films with smooth surfaces were achieved. The conductivity was of the order of 10(-2) S cm(-1). Patterning of the top resist was carried out without disturbing its lithographic performance.