The fabrication of Au nanowire by phase-control mode of USV-assisted AFM nanomachining

This paper proposed Au nanowire fabrication method combining the phase-control mode of nanomachining and the lift-off process. The conventional force-control mode of AFM nanomachining has many drawbacks such as stick-slip motion of machining, unable to directly control the machining depth, under-cutting and over-cutting. These drawbacks will lead to invalid nanopattern of resist or severe tip wear. The phase-control mode can avoid these drawbacks of conventional force-control mode. After patterning the nanogrooves by phase-control mode nanomachinng, the lift-off process is utilized to fabricate Au nanowire. Experimental result shows that width of fabricated nanowire is ∼ 50 nm. The present method also demonstrates the potential on the fabrication of three-dimension nanostructures and nanoelectronic device