Atom lithography without laser cooling

Smeets, Bart; Straten, P. van der; Meijer, T Thijs; Fabrie, C.G.C.H.M.; Leeuwen, K. A. H. van

doi:10.1007/s00340-009-3867-3

Cited by 15 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…We have observed very clear effects in our setup while depositing structures on SiOx and Si 111 . Previously reported Fe structures on Si 111 with native oxide created with a very similar setup had a typical w h of 50 nm [17], while our current line structures deposited on SiOx have a typical w h of over 80 nm.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 47%

“…11. However, the results indicate that diffusion effects of Fe on SiOx and Si 111 have a range of tens of nm and we find that the value σ for SiOx is approximately twice [17] and SiOx (w h 80 nm).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 62%

“…Whereas the simulation resulted in structure sizes of w h ≥ 35 nm, we do not find structures of w h < 80 nm on SiOx substrates. In our previous experiments on Si 111 substrates we found smaller structures of w h ≥ 50 nm [17]. A better understanding of surface effects and choice of substrate could therefore allow for better defined structures.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 72%

“…Complex laser cooling schemes can be applied, but these are experimentally challenging. The second reason for laser cooling, minimising the transverse velocity spread, was thought to be a key requirement for atom lithography [13], but was shown not to be essential by Smeets et al [17].…”

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confidence: 99%

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Structure formation in atom lithography using geometric collimation

et al. 2011

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Atom lithography uses standing wave light fields as arrays of lenses to focus neutral atom beams into line patterns on a substrate. Laser cooled atom beams are commonly used, but an atom beam source with a small opening placed at a large distance from a substrate creates atom beams which are locally geometrically collimated on the substrate. These beams have local offset angles with respect to the substrate. We show that this affects the height, width, shape, and position of the created structures. We find that simulated effects are partially obscured in experiments by substrate-dependent diffusion of atoms, while scattering and interference just above the substrate limit the quality of the standing wave lens. We find that in atom lithography without laser cooling the atom beam source geometry is imaged onto the substrate by the standing wave lens. We therefore propose using structured atom beam sources to image more complex patterns on subwavelength scales in a massively parallel way.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 47%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 62%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 72%

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confidence: 99%

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Structure formation in atom lithography using geometric collimation

et al. 2011

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“…Atom lithography continued to develop to two-and three-dimensional nanostructures in a single process, using 2D or 3D lattices [8]. There have also been demonstrations depositing Yb [9] and Fe [10,11]. Almost all the experiments accomplished so far, have used an oven source of atoms in which the beam is collimated with an aperture followed by a transverse laser cooling process [2] before traveling through a focusing potential.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Influence of s-Wave Interactions on Focussing of Atoms

Kordbacheh

Martin

2021

Atoms

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The focusing of a rubidium Bose–Einstein condensate via an optical lattice potential is numerically investigated. The results are compared with a classical trajectory model which underestimates the width of the focused beam. Via the inclusion of the effects of interactions into the classical trajectories model, we show that it is possible to obtain reliable estimates for the width of the focused beam when compared to numerical integration of the Gross–Pitaevskii equation. Finally, we investigate the optimal regimes for focusing and find that for a strongly interacting Bose–Einstein condensate focusing of order 20 nm may be possible.

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Nanofabrication by magnetic focusing of supersonic beams

et al. 2010

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We present a new method for nanoscale atom lithography. We propose the use of a supersonic atomic beam, which provides an extremely high-brightness and cold source of fast atoms. The atoms are to be focused onto a substrate using a thin magnetic film, into which apertures with widths on the order of 100 nm have been etched. Focused spot sizes near or below 10 nm, with focal lengths on the order of 10 µm, are predicted. This scheme is applicable both to precision patterning of surfaces with metastable atomic beams and to direct deposition of material.Nanoscale fabrication is a critical tool for realizing much of modern technology, including information processing, biomedical research, and photonics [1][2][3]. Optical lithography, the current method for chip mass production, is used to produce many features in parallel, but has a limited resolution due to the wavelength of light used. Electron beam (e-beam) lithography, a method for producing much smaller (order of 1 nm) features, is a serial, rather than parallel, method, meaning that it is much more time-consuming than optical lithography. Ebeam, however, is frequently used to fabricate the masks that are required by the latter. Additional methods, using vacuum ultraviolet or X-ray radiation [4], or using focused ion beams [5], are being developed in an effort to achieve high-resolution and high-throughput nanofabrication.One area of great potential for nanofabrication is atom lithography [6,7]. The deBroglie wavelength of atoms is typically much less than an optical wavelength, potentially resulting in a much smaller diffraction-limited spot size. Additionally, fabrication operations are parallelizable; much work has focused on depositing multiple lines and dots of atoms by focusing from a standing light wave [8][9][10][11][12]. In addition, atom lithography is versatile in the sense that one may either directly write structures onto a substrate [13][14][15][16][17], or may pattern a resist prior to etching, as in traditional lithography, using a beam of metastable atoms [18]. The primary limitation of optical focusing is that it is difficult to focus some of the atoms without simultaneously defocusing others, leading to significant aberrations and an unwanted underlayer of material. A method of mitigating this effect was proposed [19] and demonstrated [20], but is challenging to implement in practice. Alternative approaches, such as focusing of atoms using macroscopic magnetic lenses [21] or an "atom pinhole camera" [22] have also been explored. All the above techniques have used effusive beams, limiting atomic density to around 10 10 atoms/cm 3 , and have achieved controlled feature sizes (at best) on the order of 100 nm.In this Letter, we propose a new approach to atom lithography that should enable much smaller feature sizes and larger throughput. Our method consists of magnetic focusing of a supersonic beam through a nanofabricated magnetic mask. As nearly all atoms are paramagnetic in either the ground state or an accessible metastable state, magnetic foc...

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Atom lithography without laser cooling

Cited by 15 publications

References 22 publications

Structure formation in atom lithography using geometric collimation

Structure formation in atom lithography using geometric collimation

The Influence of s-Wave Interactions on Focussing of Atoms

Nanofabrication by magnetic focusing of supersonic beams

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