Low-cost Micro- and Nano-structures in Porous Nanomaterials Realized by Direct Imprinting of Porous Substrates

Abstract

ABSTRACTWe present a simple one-step methodology for direct structuring of porous nanomaterials on the micro- and nano-scale. Our technique, direct imprinting of porous substrates (DIPS), relies on the application of a pre-patterned and reusable stamp to directly imprint porous substrates. DIPS is performed at room temperature and pressure in less than one minute, and circumvents the conventional requirement for resist processing and etching procedures. It is shown that arbitrarily shaped patterns and structures can be transferred to porous nanomaterials with a very high (sub-100nm) feature resolution that is primarily limited by the pore dimensions of the substrate material. DIPS is demonstrated on a wide variety of porous nanomaterials including metals, semiconductors, and insulators. Furthermore, DIPS can be utilized to locally modify material properties including pore dimensions, density, dielectric function, and surface roughness. Lastly, example structures fabricated by DIPS are discussed for their relevance to important applications ranging from drug delivery and imaging, to solar energy conversion, and biosensing.