A study of resist flow during nanoimprint lithography

摘要

We have developed a method to directly observe the flow of resist arising from nanoimprint lithography. A fiducial grid was embedded in the polymer layer being imprinted, and we observed its distortions after imprinting. This embedded grid was formed by two resists, the lower of which was patterned and then overcoated with a second resist layer to form a planar surface. Optical microscopy using Normaski interference, atomic force microscopy (AFM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were all used to observe the resist after imprinting and revealed distortions in both the horizontal and vertical directions. Imprinting was carried out under various conditions and we report on the observed resist flow around a number of different pattern elements. No distortions of the grid were observed around trench defects.