Li Tong-Bao

Laser-Focused Atomic Deposition for Nanascale Grating

Laser-focused atomic deposition is a technique with which nearly resonant light is used to pattern an atom beam. To solve the problem that the result of laser-cooled atoms cannot be monitored during the 30-min depositing time, we present a three-hole mechanically precollimated aperture apparatus. A 425 nm laser light standing wave is used to focus a beam of chromium atoms to fabricate the nanoscale grating. The period of the grating is 213±0.1 nm, the height is 4 nm and the full width at half miximum is 64±6 nm.

Fabrication and measurement of traceable pitch standard with a big area at trans-scale

Atom lithography with chromium can be utilized to fabricate a pitch standard, which is directly traceable to the wavelength of the laser standing waves. The result of a calibrated commercial AFM measurement demonstrates that the pitch standard is (212.8±0.1) nm with a peak-to-valley-height (PTVH) better than 20 nm. The measurement results show the high period accuracy of traceability with the standing laser wavelength (λ/2 = 212.78 nm). The Cr nano-grating covers a 1000 μm×500 μm area, with a PTVH better than 10 nm. The feature width broadening of the Cr nanostructure has been experimentally observed along the direction of the standing waves. The PTVH along the Gaussian laser direction is similar to a Gaussian distribution. Highly uniform periodic nanostructures with a big area at the millimeter scale, and the surface growth uniformity of the Cr nano-grating, show its great potential in the application of a traceable pitch standard at trans-scales.

Atom Lithography with a Chromium Atomic Beam

Direct write atom lithography is a new technique in which resonant light is used to pattern an atomic beam and the nanostructures are formed when the atoms deposit on the substrate. We design an experiment setup to fabricate chromium nanolines by depositing an atomic beam of 52Cr through an off-resonant laser standing wave with the wavelength of 425.55 nm onto a silicon substrate. The resulting nanolines exhibit a period of 215±3 nm with height of 1 nm.

Nano-Traceability Study of a Cr Standard Grating Fabricated by Laser-Focused Atomic Deposition

A dimensional artifact is developed, which is a chromium (Cr) deposition grating fabricated by a laser-focused atomic deposition technique. The mean pitch of the grating is measured by using a metrological atomic force microscope with a large range, where a series of reference signs have been performed to locate the deposition area. Cosine error of the measurement result is analyzed and eliminated by the iterative angle calibration. The measurement result shows that the mean pitch of the grating is 212.66 ± 0.02 nm, which is very close to half of the standing laser wavelength (λ = 425.55 nm). This means that the grating has traceability with high accuracy and can substitute the laser interference technology for instrument calibration. Moreover, using the Cr deposition grating as a nano standard can shorten the traceability chain and improve the practical application.

Analysis of Cr atom focusing deposition properties in the double half Gaussian standing wave field

The use of the dipole force on atoms is a new technology that is used to build nanostructures. In this way, a high quality standard nano-grating can be obtained. Based on the semi-classical model, the motion equation is investigated and the trajectories of atoms in double half Gaussian standing wave field are simulated. Compared with the Gaussian standing wave field, the double half Gaussian standing wave can well focus the Cr atoms. In order to obtain this kind of beam, a prism is designed and the experimental result shows that the beam is well generated.

Development of MEMS-based micro capacitive tactile probe

In this paper, a micro capacitive sensor with nanometer resolution is presented for ultra-precision measurement of micro components, which is fabricated by the MEMS (micro electromechanical systems) non-silicon technique. Based on the sensor, a micro capacitive tactile probe is constructed by stylus assembly and packaging design for dimension metrology on micro/nano scale, in which a data acquiring system is developed with AD7747. Some measurements of the micro capacitive tactile probe are performed on a nano positioning and measuring machine (NMM). The measurement results show good linearity and hysteresis with a range of 11.6 μm and resolution of better than 5 nm. Hence, the micro capacitive tactile probe can be integrated on NMM to realize measurement of micro structures with nanometer accuracy.

Structured mirror array for two-dimensional collimation of a chromium beam in atom lithography

Direct-write atom lithography, one of the potential nanofabrication techniques, is restricted by some difficulties in producing optical masks for the deposition of complex structures. In order to make further progress, a structured mirror array is developed to transversely collimate the chromium atomic beam in two dimensions. The best collimation is obtained when the laser red detunes by natural line-width of transition 7S3 → 7P04 of the chromium atom. The collimation ratio is 0.45 vertically (in x axis), and it is 0.55 horizontally (in y axis). The theoretical model is also simulated, and success of our structured mirror array is achieved.

Analysis of Aberrations in Laser-Focused Nanofabrication

Based on the semi-classical model, we analyse the motion equation of chromium atoms in the laser standing wave field under the condition of low intensity light field using fourth-order Adams–Moulton algorithm. The trajectory of the atoms is obtained in the standing wave field by analytical simulation. The image distortion coming from aberrations is analysed and the effects on focal beam features are also discussed. Besides these influences, we also discuss the effects on contrast as well as the feature width of the atomic beam due to laser power and laser beam waist. The simulation results have shown that source imperfection, especially the transverse velocity spread, plays a critical role in broadening the feature width. Based on these analyse, we present some suggestions to minimize these influences.