SGER: Step-Place-Grow Assembly - An Approach to Economical, Environmentally Benign Manufacturing of Ordered Nano Structures

这一探索性研究小额赠款(SGER)奖为探索制造有序纳米结构的新方法提供了资金。步进-放置-生长组装方法将利用可重复使用的模板来创建纳米结构，该结构可以完全就地生长，也可以由先前制造的纳米粉末、管、线、棒和纤维就地组装。最初的工作将集中在生长高度和宽度尺寸小于100纳米的聚苯胺纳米线。聚合物纳米线在电子学和传感器应用方面引起了人们的极大兴趣，该工艺提供了在单个集成步骤中为这些应用创建接触纳米线的能力。模板材料从生长的结构中释放，以及在生长之前精确填充纳米通道等问题将在这里根据我们在聚苯胺方面的经验进一步讨论。与大批量生产相关的制造问题，如跨大面积基板工作，对多层结构的适用性，以及处理制造差异和不均匀问题将被探索。此外，还将探讨工艺参数和控制等制造问题，以解决工艺可变性、可重复质量和工艺良率等问题。如果成功，分步放置生长组装方法有可能成为一种可行和经济的生产工艺，因为以下方面：消除了拾取和放置，消除了对模板的重复构建和蚀刻移除的需要，工艺链短，适用于广泛的材料，适用于大范围的区域，对纳米结构包容的控制，以及建立不同材料和不相连区域的大阵列结构的可能性。此外，这种方法具有环保意识，因为它提供了一种构建涉及纳米颗粒和纳米线的结构的途径，其中纳米元素只包含和制造所需数量的纳米元素，同时使用较短的工艺链。该方法还为纳米元件的定位问题提供了一种普遍的解决方案。

This Small Grant for Exploratory Research (SGER) award provides funding for the exploration of a new approach towards manufacturing of ordered nano structures. The Step-Place-Grow Assembly approach will utilize a reusable template to create nano stuctures that can be either totally grown in place, or assembled in place from previously made nano-powders, tubes, wires, rods, and fibers. Initial work will focus on growing polyanline nano-wires with height and width dimensions of less than 100 nm. Polymer nano-wires are of considerable interest for electronics and sensor applications and the process offers the ability to create contacted nano-wires for these applications in a single integrated step. Issues such as template materials release from the grown structure and precise filling of the nano channels prior to growth will be further addressed here building on our experience with polyaniline. Manufacturing issues related to large volume production such as working across large area substrates, applicability to multi-level structures, and dealing with manufacturing variation and non uniformity will be explored. Additionally manufacturing issues such as process parameters and control to address process variability, repeatable quality and process yields will be explored. If successful, the Step-Place-Grow Assembly approach has the potential to be a viable and economical production process due to the following: the elimination of pick and place, elimination of the need for the repeated building and etching removal of templates, short process chain, applicability to wide range of materials, applicability to large areas, control of nano-structure containment, and potential to build large arrays of structures of dissimilar materials and disconnected regions. Additionally, this approach is environmentally conscious since it offers an pathway to the building of structures involving nanoparticles and nanowires, in which the nano-elements are contained and made only in the required number, while using shorter process chains. The approach also provides a generalized solution to the problem of positioning nano elements.