Fabrication of hybrid nanostructured arrays using a PDMS/PDMS replication process

Area of Science:

• Materials Science and Engineering
• Nanotechnology
• Polymer Science

Background:

• Nanostructured materials offer unique properties for advanced applications.
• Replication processes are crucial for scalable nanofabrication.
• Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) is a versatile polymer for micro/nanofabrication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a novel, cost-effective nanofabrication process for polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) nanostructured arrays.
• To investigate the effect of thin film coatings on the PDMS replication process.
• To demonstrate the controllability and robustness of the proposed nanoreplication method.

Main Methods:

• Monolayer self-assembly of polystyrene (PS) spheres for initial template creation.
• PDMS nanoreplication using replica moulding to form a PDMS template.
• Thin film coating (platinum or gold) of the PDMS template.
• PDMS to PDMS (PDMS/PDMS) replication to create the final nanostructured array.

Main Results:

• A minimum coating thickness of 20 nm gold or 40 nm platinum improved PDMS slurry contact angle and eased peeling.
• Achieved defect-free, undistorted PDMS nanostructured arrays with highly ordered hexagonal arrangements.
• Demonstrated control over nanostructure geometry by varying the deposited layer thickness.

Conclusions:

• The proposed method is a simple, controllable, and robust nanoreplication technique.
• Thin metal coatings are essential for successful PDMS/PDMS replication.
• The developed process shows significant promise for fabricating functional nanostructured PDMS for diverse applications.