Aberration-Corrected Electron Beam Lithography at the One Nanometer Length Scale.

Area of Science:

• Nanotechnology
• Materials Science
• Electron Microscopy

Background:

• Achieving sub-4 nm patterning is a major challenge in nanotechnology.
• Conventional electron-beam lithography (EBL) struggles to reliably produce features below 4 nm.
• Existing high-resolution techniques are significantly slower than EBL.

Purpose of the Study:

• To demonstrate the capability of aberration-corrected EBL for high-resolution nanofabrication.
• To achieve unprecedented resolution in patterning polymer resists.
• To explore pattern transfer to other materials at the nanoscale.

Main Methods:

• Utilized an aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscope for lithography.
• Employed poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) as the resist material.
• Performed pattern transfer to semiconductor and metallic materials.

Main Results:

• Achieved aberration-corrected EBL at the one nanometer length scale.
• Produced the smallest isolated feature in a conventional resist (1.7 ± 0.5 nm).
• Generated high-density patterns in PMMA (10.7 nm pitch negative-tone, 17.5 nm pitch positive-tone).
• Demonstrated sub-5 nm pattern transfer to semiconductor and metallic materials.

Conclusions:

• Aberration-corrected EBL enables polymer-based nanofabrication with feature sizes comparable to the Kuhn length of PMMA.
• This technique offers significantly improved resolution, speed, and complexity for nanomaterial fabrication.
• The findings pave the way for advanced applications in nanotechnology requiring ultra-high resolution patterning.