Direct Writing of Sub-5 nm Hafnium Diboride Metallic Nanostructures

In a technique called electron beam induced deposition (EBID), electrons from a scanning tunneling microscope (STM) tip can induce deposition of materials onto surfaces by ionization of gases that are near the tip surface region.  EBID has previously been used to write sub-10 nm features, but in many cases the deposits contain less than 50 at. % metal, with consequent degradation of properties.  It has been stated that “Perhaps the greatest single limitation of EBID is that metal-containing nanostructures deposited from organometallic precursors typically possess unacceptable levels of organic contamination.”

Doc.: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nn1018522. 

Ye, W., Peña MArtin, P., Kumar, N., A. Rocket, A., R. Abelson, J., Gitolami, G., & W. Lyding, J. (2010). Direct Writing of Sub-5 nm Hafnium Diboride Metallic Nanostructures. ASC Nano, 6818-6824