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Title: Dissolvable Template Nanoimprint Lithography: A Facile and Versatile Nanoscale Replication Technique

Journal Article · · Nano Letters
ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [2]; ORCiD logo [4];  [2];  [5]; ORCiD logo [6]
  1. Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States); University College, London (United Kingdom)
  2. U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center, Champaign, IL (United States). Construction Engineering Research Lab.
  3. U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center, Champaign, IL (United States). Construction Engineering Research Lab.; Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
  4. Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States)
  5. Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States). Beckman Inst. for Advanced Science and Technology; Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States)
  6. Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States); Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States). Frederick Seitz Materials Research Lab. (FS-MRL); Kyushu Univ., Fukuoka (Japan). International Inst. for Carbon Neutral Energy Research (WPI-I2CNER)

Nanoimprinting lithography (NIL) is a next-generation nanofabrication method, capable of replicating nanostructures from original master surfaces. In this work, we develop highly scalable, simple, and nondestructive NIL using a dissolvable template. Termed dissolvable template nanoimprinting lithography (DT-NIL), our method utilizes an economic thermoplastic resin to fabricate nanoimprinting templates, which can be easily dissolved in simple organic solvents. Additionally, we used the DT-NIL method to replicate cicada wings which have surface nanofeatures of ~100 nm in height. The master, template, and replica surfaces showed a >~94% similarity based on the measured diameter and height of the nanofeatures. The versatility of DT-NIL was also demonstrated with the replication of re-entrant, multiscale, and hierarchical features on fly wings, as well as hard silicon wafer-based artificial nanostructures. The DT-NIL method can be performed under ambient conditions with inexpensive materials and equipment. Our work opens the door to opportunities for economical and high-throughput nanofabrication processes.

Research Organization:
Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA); US Army Research Office (ARO); U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research; Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA); National Science Foundation (NSF)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC04-94AL85000; W9132T-16-2-0011; 1554249; NA0003525
OSTI ID:
1650158
Report Number(s):
SAND-2020-8198J; 689817
Journal Information:
Nano Letters, Vol. 20, Issue 10; ISSN 1530-6984
Publisher:
American Chemical SocietyCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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