Electron Beam Recording Research Articles

Diffraction Structures Formed by Two Crossed Superimposed Diffraction Gratings

The diffraction patterns generated by surface relief diffraction structures that consisted of two identical crossed, superimposed gratings formed in the As2S3 thin films by electron beam recording and subsequent chemical etching were studied. The angle between the gratings with grating periods equal to 2 μm was varied between 2° and 90°. Additional diffraction gratings formed by a set of the intersection nodes of the basic grating lines were considered to simulate the diffraction patterns. The circular symmetric diffraction structure composed of four crossed superimposed gratings with equal periods has been considered as a combination of pairs of crossed, superimposed gratings. A good agreement between the calculated and experimental diffraction patterns is observed.

Electron-beam recording of surface structures on As-S-Se chalcogenide thin films

The effect of electron beam irradiation on the amorphous chalcogenide film As38S36Se26 was studied. The formation of cones with a Gaussian profile on the surfaces of the films was found after local electron irradiation. Exposition dependent evolution of height surface nanostructures has been detected. The dependence of the height of surface nanostructures on the dose of irradiation is analyzed. Charge accumulation model into interaction region between the film and the electron beam was used to explain the electron-induced phenomena of the surface structure of amorphous As38S36Se26 films. Charges relaxation times, and electron beam penetration depth into film, and the initial and inverse doses are determined.

SUPERIMPOSED EQUALLY ORIENTED DIFFRACTION GRATINGS FORMED IN As2S3 FILMS

Surface relief diffraction structures composed of two or three superimposed unidirectional gratings with unequal grating periods were produced using the electron beam recording and subsequent chemical etching. Diffraction patterns produced by different diffraction structures were studied. In addition to the main diffracted beams the low-intensity “ghost” diffracted beams were created by some grating structures. Their appearance was caused by a difference in spatial frequency between gratings and by summation of spatial frequencies as well. The calculated grating periods corresponding to “ghost” diffracted beams were found to agree well with those determined from diffraction patterns.

The effect of electron beam irradiation on silver–sodium ion exchange in silicate glasses

It is shown experimentally that electron irradiation of sodium–silicate glasses makes possible the control of the subsequent ion exchange Ag+↔Na+ process in a salt melt. The reason of this effect is the negatively charged regions formation in a glass volume during electron irradiation. The electric field, produced by these regions in glass volume, results in positive Na+ ions field migration into them. The spatial redistribution of Na+ ions results in the decrease of the ion exchange efficiency, or the ion exchange can be even blocked. This led to the decrease of the luminescence intensity of neutral silver molecular clusters in the irradiated zone, and effect on the silver nanoparticles formation during the subsequent thermal treatment. The observed effects can be used for the control of ion exchange processes during integrated optics devices fabrication, and for the electron-beam recording of optical information.

Electron beam recording of microdomains on the nonpolar LiNbO3 crystal surface at different SEM accelerating voltages

The effect of the accelerating voltage U of the SEM electron beam on the characteristics of microdomains recorded by the electron beam method on the nonpolar Y-surface of LiNbO3 crystals has been studied. The thickness Td of domains in the Y direction is determined by the depth range Re of primary electrons, which depends on U. This makes it possible to define Td in the range of 0.2–4 μm at U = 5–25 kV, respectively. The electron emission coefficient σ is estimated for different values of U exceeding the second equilibrium point U2 (σ = 1) in the σ(U) diagram. These data are used to construct the dependence σ(U) for LiNbO3. Based on the exposure characteristics of the length Ld of domains growing along the polar Z axis, the dependence of the space charge field controlling the domain planar growth along Z on the surface electron emission σ is found.

Design and fabrication of a metallic nanostamp using UV nanoimprinting and electroforming for replicating discrete track media with feature size of 35 nm

The demand for high-density data-storage media is increasing, necessitating the development of novel magnetic data-storage technologies. Among the various types of storage media, discrete track media (DTM) is an emerging technology that is being used to overcome the limitations of conventional continuous magnetic data-storage technology, such as the superparamagnetic effect and medium noise. In this study, the authors propose a method of fabricating a metallic stamp for replicating DTM patterns using ultraviolet (UV) nanoimprinting and electroforming, which are inexpensive processes that can be used to fabricate nanostructures with high precision. First, a silicon nanomaster with a feature size of 35 nm and a pitch of 70 nm was designed and fabricated by electron-beam recording and inductively coupled plasma etching. The measured pitch of the silicon master was 71.6 nm. Then, a polymeric master with a full track of nanoline patterns was then replicated from the silicon nanomaster via UV nanoimprinting. To improve the releasing properties during UV nanoimprinting, the silicon nanomaster was coated with a self-assembled monolayer of fluoroctatrichlorosilane. The measured average pitch and height of the replicated polymer master were 71.5 and 61 nm, respectively. Then, a metallic nanostamp with a thickness of 300 μm and a diameter of 80 mm was fabricated using electroforming. The metallic nanostamp was successfully fabricated, and its geometrical properties were measured and analyzed. The pitch and height of fabricated nickel stamp were 71.2 and 60.3 nm, respectively.

High-Density Electron-Beam Recording of Circumferentially Aligned Dots by Using Substrates with Low Atomic Numbers

High-Density Electron-Beam Recording of Circumferentially Aligned Dots by Using Substrates with Low Atomic Numbers

High-Density Electron-Beam Recording of Circumferentially Aligned Dots by Using Substrates with Low Atomic Numbers

Reducing proximity effects is a key factor for achieving a higher resolution in electron-beam lithography and realizing the mastering of patterned media. The effect of substrate materials on backscattering electrons was investigated by simulation and experiment, and resolution enhancement was demonstrated. In Monte Carlo simulations with 100 keV incident electrons, the intensity of backscattering electrons decreased with decreasing atomic number of substrates. On the other hand, both the density of substrates and the existence of 10 nm thin films had negligible effects on the intensity of backscattering electrons. The measured exposure distributions from line-scanned electron beams supported the results of simulations. The intensity of backscattering electrons was reduced by using a carbon substrate, and circumferentially aligned high-density patterns of 878 Gbit/in.2 were resolved.

Surface patterning on amorphous chalcogenide nanomultilayers

The surface patterning on amorphous chalcogenide nanomultilayers was successfully performed employing laser-irradiation or electron-beam recording. Significant changes of thickness reaching up to 10% of initial values investigated by AFM are accompanied by modifications of optical transmittance and refractive index. Observed phenomena can be used for the one-step fabrication of micro-optical elements.

Surface pattern recording in amorphous chalcogenide layers

Investigations of light-induced volume expansion and surface pattern recording in amorphous chalcogenide layers and nano-layered structures (NLS) were extended to direct electron-beam recording on Se/As 2S 3 and Sb/As 2S 3 NLS. Light as well as e-beam induced bleaching occurs in all NLS, while volume expansion occurs only in chalcogenide–chalcogenide NLS and in homogeneous Se or As 2S 3 layers. Comparison of these two phenomena revealed the possible role of purely electronic and thermal processes in the interdiffusion and relief formation. The latter is supposed to be connected with radiation-induced defect creation, free volume increase under the increased fluidity conditions as well as with the possible additional influence of electrostatic forces and stress.

Diffraction and luminescent structures based on chalcogenide glasses and polymers

AbstractDiffraction optical structures are the main elements of diffraction optics with the perspectives for application in the systems of filtering, multiplexing, routing, focusing, and collimating of the light, as well as for fabrication of the photonic crystals. Thin films prepared from chalcogenide glasses and polymers were used for the fabrication of diffractive structures by holographic and electron‐beam recording technology. The electric field and other technological procedures have been used during the holographic writing process in order to increase the diffraction efficiency and the spatial density of the recording media. The problem of obtaining low‐cost but efficient luminescent materials is still present. It was shown that intensive luminescence is manifested from composite materials consisting of arsenic sulfide and arsenic selenide doped with rare‐earth ions (Dy3+ and Pr3+), and polymers polyvinylalcohol or polyvinylpyrrolidone.

Fabrication of Metallic Nano Stamp to Replicate Patterned Substrate Using Electron-Beam Recording, Nanoimprinting, and Electroforming

A cost-effective method to fabricate metallic nano stamp with full tracks of nano hole patterns with diameter of 30 nm and pitch of 50 nm was developed for nano replicating nano patterned substrate. Electron-beam recording (EBR) and inductively coupled plasma etching process were used in order to fabricate the original silicon master with hole patterns. Polymeric master with full tracks of nano pillar patterns was replicated from the original silicon master by UV nanoimprinting process. For the successful releasing during UV nanoimprinting process, self assembled monolayer of fluoroctatrichlorosilane was deposited on the original silicon master. With this approach, the expensive silicon master could be reused many times as a master mold. Nickel seed layer as conductive layer was deposited onto the polymeric master using sputtering process. Nano-electroforming process using nickel sulfamate solution was used to fabricate metallic nano stamp. Metallic nano stamp with full tracks of hole patterns having diameter of 30 nm, pitch of 50 nm, track width of 1.3 mm, and track inner diameter of 40 mm was successfully fabricated. The present method will provide an important mean to mass fabricate patterned media.

Electrostatic field induced patterning: A method for controlling the anisotropy of thin films of polar organic molecules

The molecular orientation of anisotropic organic molecules also depends on the presence of electrostatic charges on the surface of low conductive substrates. Unknown charges may be the origin of poor reproducibility, while controlled charge patterns may be used as a tool for the preparation of partly oriented films. Different techniques for the creation of surface charge patterns have been applied: friction with a pen or brush, corona discharge, sliding electrical contact wire, exposure with ultraviolet light (UV exposure), and electron-beam (e-beam) recording. The orientational order was checked by measuring the angular dependence of the absorption constant.

Advanced Research in Ultra-High Density Nonmagnetic On-Camera Storage

A novel high-speed, high-capacity electron-beam recording technique is described in this paper. The electron beam is generated with carbon nanotube technology. The key parameters for generating the recording beam are described, followed by a discussion of a strawman design. The technique provides higher recording densities and higher data rates than possible with conventional magnetic-recording hard drives. The design parameters were, in part, selected to satisfy the data rate and recording capacity requirements of digital film cameras.

Electron Beam Recording with a Novel Differential Pumping Head Realizing More than 50 GB/Layer Capacity Disc

We developed an electron beam recorder with a novel differential pumping head, which produces a local high-vacuum area for an electron beam by balancing nitrogen gas flow into and out of the head. Regarding recording speed, it was confirmed to be as high as 4.92 m/s while maintaining a 10-3 Pa vacuum condition. In order to achieve a high speed recording velocity, we introduced an electron gun with a low acceleration voltage (15 kV) and a chemically amplified resist to the mastering to make resist sensitivity very high. In addition, it takes only 2 min to exchange the Si substrate. As for the performance of the electron beam mastering, a bottom jitter value appropriate for mass production was obtained from a 25 GB/layer capacity disc. We also fabricated a 50 GB/layer capacity disc and confirmed the HF signal using a near-field optical pick up for the first time. Furthermore, we were able to fabricate a 100 GB/layer capacity disc using our electron beam recorder.

Electron beam recording of optical disc

The Nimbus Technology & Engineering e −Beam Mastering System was developed to gain a large improvement in optical disc and structured hard disc recording capacity, significantly more than is possible from deep UV and SIL mastering. The current electron beam recorder is essentially a production machine capable of making full-length exposures at capacities of up to 50 GB with a simple low-cost upgrade path to disc capacities of several hundred gigabytes and beyond and hard disk drives (HDD) with capacities of up to 1 tera bit per square inch.

The Path from a Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) using a Red Laser to a DVD using a Blue Laser

The next generation digital versatile disc(DVD) using a blue laser is required to have 15 Gbytes capacity so that it can reproduce motion picture expert group 2(MPEG2) video stream with a main profile at a high level format for a maximum of 133 min. To achieve this goal, further improvements are necessary in both the recording and the reproducing systems. For the recording system the authors developed a super resolution recording material and an electron beam recording system. For the reproducing system the authors devised four technologies: a Viterbi decoder, a liquid crystal tilt servo system, a cross talk cancel system and a tangential adaptive equalizer. By combining these with a pick up head of 430 nm vavelength/0.6 NA lens and a 0.6-mm-thick substrate, the authors confirmed sufficient tilt margins in the case of 12.7 Gbytes (radial tilt margin: ±1.61°, tangential tilt margin: ±0.48°). Our next target is to work on the 15 Gbytes capacity.

High Density Mastering Using Electron Beam

A mastering system for the next-generation digital versatile disk (DVD) is required to have a higher resolution compared with the conventional mastering systems. We have developed an electron beam mastering machine which features a thermal field emitter and a vacuum sealed air spindle motor. Beam displacement caused by magnetic fluctuation with spindle rotation was about 60 nm(p-p) in both the radial and tangential directions. Considering the servo gain of a read-out system, it has little influence on the read-out signal in terms of tracking errors and jitters. The disk performance was evaluated by recording either the 8/16 modulation signal or a groove on the disk. The electron beam recording showed better jitter values from the disk playback than those from a laser beam recorder. The deviation of track pitch was 44 nm(p-p). We also confirmed the high density recording with a capacity reaching 30 GB.

ホログラフィック光学素子を用いたリアルタイム３次元ディスプレイ

A display system requiring no special glasses is a useful technology for three-dimensional (3-D) images. The lenticular display system has such demerits as having a non-planer screen and blurred images. In this paper, a newly developed, 3-D real-time display with a holographic optical element (HOE) is described. This simple 3-D display can avoid problems of lenticular systems. The advantage of the screen HOE is that the number of presented views is much greater that of an equivalent lenticular display, because the screen HOE can multiplex pixels both horizontally and vertically to display lateral views. This screen HOE can be made more easily and smoothly than an electron beam recording. The trial screen HOE is 4“×5” and consists of 128, 000 holograms. Therefore, the image size measures approximately 4“× 5”, and the resolution is 200×160 pixels×4 views.

HDTV Electron Beam Recording

In the early days of HDTV's exposure to the production community, it became evident that a close synergetic relationship with 35mm film would bring a major new flexibility to program production and distribution. The combination of high performance and a new cost-effectiveness holds promise for the use of HDTV in the production of lower-budget motion pictures. In addition, the use of HDTV for electronic blue-screen process and special effects, with subsequent transfer to film, offers an important new production tool to the traditional motion-picture industry. This article describes the first electron beam recording system put into full-time service to implement transfers of 1125/60 HDTV videotape recordings to 35mm film.