• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2003.06a
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• pp.199-202
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• 2003

Ultraviolet-nanoimprint lithography (UV-NIL) is a promising method for cost-effectively defining nanoscale structures at room temperature and low pressure. Since the resolution of nanostructures depends strongly upon that of nanostamps, the nanostamp fabrication technology is a key technology to UV-NIL. In this paper, a 5$\times$5$\times$0.09 in. quartz stamp whose critical dimension is 377 nm was fabricated using the etch process in which a Cr film was employed as a hard mask for transferring nanostructures onto the quartz plate. To effectively apply tile fabricated 5-in. stamp to UV-NIL on a 4-in. Si wafer, we have proposed a new UV-NIL process using a multi-dispensing method as a way to supply resist on a wafer Experiments have shown that the multi-dispensing method can enable UV-NIL rising a large-area stamp.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.15-20
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• 2013

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is the next generation photolithography process in which the photoresist is dispensed onto the substrate in its liquid form and then imprinted and cured into a desired pattern instead of using traditional optical system. There have been considerable attentions on NIL due to its potential abilities that enable cost-effective and high-throughput nanofabrication to the display device and semiconductor industry. In this paper, a pressure vessel type imprinting system was used to imprint patterns with two type pressure values (25 bar, 30 bar) and two type pressure keeping times (5 min, 10 min). The height of transferred pattern and the thickness of residual layer were measured and effects of pressurization conditions - pressure and pressure keeping time - on the pattern transfer in thermal NIL were investigated.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.29 no.6 s.237
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• pp.852-859
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• 2005

Molecular dynamics simulations of nanoimprint lithography in which a stamp with patterns is pressed onto amorphous poly-(methylmethacrylate) (PMMA) surface are performed to study the deformation of polymer. Force fields including bond, angle, torsion, inversion, van der Waals and electrostatic potential are used to describe the intermolecular and intramolecular force of PMMA molecules and stamp. Periodic boundary condition is used in horizontal direction and Nose-Hoover thermostat is used to control the system temperature. As the simulation results, the adhesion forces between stamp and polymer are calculated and the mechanism of deformation are investigated. The effects of the adhesion and friction forces on the polymer deformation are also studied to analyze the pattern transfer in nanoimprint lithography. The mechanism of polymer deformation is investigated by means of inspecting the indentation process, molecular configurational properties, and molecular configurational energies.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.144-153
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• 2009

It is widely known that no-slip assumptions are often violated on regular basis in micrometer- or nanometer-scale fluid flow. In the case of cavity-filling process of nanoimprint lithography(NIL), slip phenomena take place naturally at the solid-to-liquid boundaries, that is, at the mold-to-polymer or polymer-to-substrate boundaries. If the slip or partial slip phenomena are promoted at the boundaries, the processing time of NIL, especially of thermal-NIL which consumes more tact time than that of UV-NIL, can be significantly improved. In this paper it is aimed to elucidate how the cavity-filling process of NIL can be influenced by the slip phenomena at boundaries and to what degree those phenomena increase the process rate. To do so, computational fluid dynamics(CFD) analysis of cavity filling process has been carried out. Also, the effect of mold pattern shape and initial thickness of polymer resist were considered in the analysis, as well.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.41 no.6
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• pp.331-334
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• 2008

The replica of highly ordered nano-sphere array patterns were fabricated using hot embossing method. First, silica nano-sphere array on Si substrate was transferred to PVC film at $130^{\circ}C$ and 7 bar using hot embossing process. Then, silica nano-sphere array on PVC template was removed by soaking the PVC film in buffered oxide etcher. In order to form anti-stiction layer, the PVC template was coated with silicon dioxide layer and self-assembled monolayer. Through UV nanoimprint lithography with the fabricated flexible PVC template, highly ordered nano-sphere array pattern was imprinted on curved substrates with high fidelity.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.20-26
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• 2008

Nanoimprint lithography(NIL) is becoming next generation lithography of significant interest due to its low cost and a potential patterning resolution of 10nm or less. Success of the NIL relies on the adequate conditions of pressure, temperature and time. To have the adequate conditions for NIL, one has to understand the polymer flowing behavior during the imprinting process. In this paper, an analytical approach of polymer flow in thermal NIL was performed based on the squeeze flow with partial slip boundary conditions. Velocity profiles and pressure distributions of the polymer flow were obtained and imprinting forces and residual thickness were predicted with the consideration of the slip velocity between the polymer and the mold/substrate. The results show that the consideration of the slip is very important for investigating the polymer flow in Thermal NIL.

• Fibers and Polymers
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.113-119
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• 2002

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is a nanofabrication method known to be a low cost method of fabricating nanoscale patterns as small as 6 m. This study is focused on understanding physical phenomena in the embossing of nano/micro scale structures with 100 nm minimum feature size. We present the effects of capillary force and width of stamp groove on flow behavior at the embossing stage through numerical experimentation. We also compare our numerical results with previous experimental results and discuss our results.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.68-75
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• 2009

A major disadvantage of thermal nanoimprint lithography(NIL) is the thermal cycle, that is, heating over glass transition temperature and then cooling below it, which requires a significant amount of processing time and limits the throughput. One of the methods to overcome this disadvantage is to make the processing temperature lower Accordingly, it is necessary to determine the effects on the processing parameters for thermal NIL at reduced temperatures and to optimize the parameters. This starts with a clear understanding of polymer material behavior during the NIL process. In this work, the squeezing and filling of thin polymer films into nanocavities during the low temperature thermal NIL have been investigated based upon a two-dimensional viscoelastic finite element analysis in order to understand how the process conditions affect a pattern quality; Pressure and initial polymer resist thickness dependency of cavity filling behaviors has been investigated.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.76-81
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• 2008

Nanoimprint lithography(NIL) is an emerging technology enabling cost-effective and high-throughput nanofabrication. Among NILs, significant efforts from both academia and industry have been put in UV NIL research and development because of its ability to pattern at room temperature and at low pressure. In UV NIL, there may be in-line set-up error of the stamp and the substrate. To compensate this error, the dummy blocks are put on the stamp and pressurized uniformly. Contact problems between the stamp and the photoresist layer on the substrate are often happened, which results in the non-uniform residual layer In this paper, the pressurization method on the dummy block is investigated by the finite element method. A new method is recommended and evaluated far the uniform stamp deformation.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.93-98
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• 2013

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is a next generation technology for fabrication of micrometer and nanometer scale patterns. There have been considerable attentions on NIL due to its potential abilities that enable cost-effective and high-throughput nanofabrication to the display device and semiconductor industry. To successfully imprint a nanosized pattern with the thermal NIL, the process conditions such as temperature and pressure should be appropriately selected. This starts with a clear understanding of polymer material behavior during the thermal NIL process. In this paper, a filling process of the polymer resist into nanometer scale cavities during the thermal NIL at the temperature range, where the polymer resist shows the viscoelastic behaviors with consideration of stress relaxation effect of the polymer. In the simulation, the filling process and the residual layer formation are numerically investigated. And the effects of pressure and temperature on NIL process, specially the residual layer formation are discussed.