Nanolithography with metastable helium atoms in a high-power standing-wave light field

Abstract

We have created periodic nanoscale structures in a gold substrate with a lithography process using metastable triplet helium atoms that damage a hydrophobic resist layer on top of the substrate. A beam of metastable helium atoms is transversely collimated and guided through an intense standing-wave light field. Compared to commonly used low-power optical masks, a high-power light field (saturation parameter of 10⁷) increases the confinement of the atoms in the standing wave considerably, and makes the alignment of the experimental setup less critical. Due to the high internal energy of the metastable helium atoms (20 eV), a dose of only one atom per resist molecule is required. With an exposure time of only eight minutes, parallel lines with a separation of 542 nm and a width of 100 nm (one-eleventh of the wavelength used for the optical mask) are created.