In situ measurement of annealing-induced line shape decay in nanoimprinted polymers using scatterometry

Published

March 2, 2009

Author(s)

Heather J. Patrick, Thomas A. Germer, Yifu Ding, Hyun Wook Ro, Lee J. Richter, Christopher L. Soles

Abstract

Thermal embossing nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is an area of continuing interest because it allows direct patterning of nanoscale structures into a wide variety of functional polymer materials. Measuring the shape evolution of nanoimprinted lines during thermal annealing can provide insights into mechanisms of polymer stability and the dynamics of polymer flow. Recently, we have used optical scatterometry to extract the profile of nanoimprinted lines in low- and high-molecular mass polymer gratings during annealing of the gratings at the glass transition temperature. The data are obtained in situ using a spectroscopic ellipsometer and analyzed using a rigorous-coupled-wave scatterometry model. The results obtained from scatterometry are in very good agreement with those measured ex situ by atomic force microscopy and specular x-ray reflectivity, revealing very different decay mechanisms for gratings in low- and high-molecular mass polymers. The role of the selection of grating model in determining the uncertainties the grating line profile extracted from scatterometry is also discussed.

Proceedings Title

Proceedings of the SPIE Conference on Alternative Lithographic Technologies, SPIE vol. 7271, 2009.

Conference Dates

February 22-27, 2009

Conference Location

San Jose, CA

Conference Title

SPIE Alternative Lithographic Technologies, part of SPIE Advanced Lithography

Pub Type

Conferences

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Keywords

nanoimprint, optical critical dimension, polymers, scatterometry, spectroscopic ellipsometry, stress, rheology

Citation

Patrick, H. , Germer, T. , Ding, Y. , , H. , Richter, L. and Soles, C. (2009), In situ measurement of annealing-induced line shape decay in nanoimprinted polymers using scatterometry, Proceedings of the SPIE Conference on Alternative Lithographic Technologies, SPIE vol. 7271, 2009., San Jose, CA, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=901568 (Accessed April 19, 2024)