Fabrication of flexible nano-wired polarizer by contact-transferred and mask embedded lithography and polyurethane acrylate mold

Abstract

This work describes using a rigiflex polyurethane acrylate (PUA) mold for the contact-transferred and mask embedded lithography (CMEL), and therefore provides a new approach in nano-fabrication. Based on this fabrication process, metallic linear-grating patterns are successfully embedded into a polymer substrate with the following two cases: (1) line-width of 65 nm, period of 130 nm, area size of 2×2.5 cm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> ; (2) line-width of 60 nm, period of 180 nm, area size of 5×5 cm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> . These metallic nano-wired polymer substrates can be used as flexible polarizer and their optical performances have been characterized. Advantages and potential application of this nano-fabrication method will be addressed.