Development of a simple, compact, low-cost interference lithography system

Interference lithography (IL) has proven itself to be an enabling technology for nanofabrication. Within IL, issues of spatial phase distortion, fringe stability, and substrate development have been explored and addressed. However, IL tools are still unnecessarily expensive, large, and complex. To address these issues, the authors previously built a simple IL tool that used a blue laser diode to produce similar to 300 nm pitch structures. The resulting patterned areas (similar to mm(2)) were limited by both the temporal and spatial coherence of the laser. Here, the authors report on the advancement of their low-cost interference lithography tool that makes use of newly available blue laser diodes and a simplified spatial filter to print larger-area (similar to cm(2)) patterns. With this configuration, the authors have designed and implemented a small-footprint (similar to 0.2 m(2)) Lloyd's mirror IL tool that can be assembled for less than similar to 6000 USD. (C) 2010 American Vacuum Society. [DOI: 10.1116/1.3504498]