Surface modification of an organosilane self-assembled monolayer on silicon substrates using atomic force microscopy: Scanning probe electrochemistry toward nanolithography

Hiroyuki Sugimura, Takayuki Hanji, Kazuyuki Hayashi and Osamu Takai

Department of Materials Processing Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Nagoya University, Chikusa, Nagoya 464-8603, Japan

Organosilane self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) have been successfully applied to resist materials for nanolithography based on the electrochemically induced degradation of the monolayer under an SPM-probe [1]. Here we report on nanopatterning of an organosilane SAM prepared on Si substrates from a precursor of octadecyltrimethoxysilane using an conductive-probe AFM. The degradation of the monolayer was studied by lateral force and Kelvin-probe force microscopies.

[1] H. Sugimura and N. Nakagiri, Langmuir 11 (1995) 3623; H. Sugimura, O. Takai and N. Nakagiri, J. Vac. Sci. Technol. B, 17 (1999) 1605.