Controlled additive fabrication of metallic nanostructures with focused soft X-rays

聚焦x射线束诱导沉积（FXBID）是一种控制金属纳米结构制备的新方法。它结合了x射线光刻和聚焦电子束诱导金属有机前体分子沉积的概念。由于FXBID是基于x射线吸收，沉积速率受到入射光子能量的影响。这使得能量选择性纳米制造成为可能。提出者和他的合作者的初步研究导致了一个成功的概念证明。在下一步中，需要对前体破碎过程有更深入的了解。这个问题将通过气相研究光激发前体分子的能量依赖衰变通道和与次级电子相互作用时产生的碎片率来解决。这些研究将入射光子能量与沉积速率联系起来，旨在改善能量选择性FXBID。对前驱体-衬底相互作用和原位净化技术（例如，共投加反应气体、退火、热衬底等）的进一步研究，将为制造具有有趣的电子和/或磁性质的纯金属镀层确定最佳实验条件。高分辨率菲涅耳带片将用于评估FXBID的分辨率极限。最后，详细研究了FXBID纳米结构的性能及其总体限制。拟议的项目解决了FXBID科学基础上的几个开放问题，并将展示其作为现有纳米制造技术的替代方案的潜力。

Focused X-ray beam induced deposition (FXBID) is a novel approach for the controlled fabrication of metallic nanostructures. It combines the concepts of X-ray lithography and focused electron beam induced deposition from metal organic precursor molecules. Since FXBID is based on X-ray absorption, deposition rates are influenced by incident photon energy. This enables energy-selective nanofabrication. Preliminary studies of the proposer and his collaborators resulted in a successful proof of concept. Within the next step a deeper understanding of the precursor fragmentation processes is required. This issue will be addressed by gas-phase studies on the energy-dependent decay channels of photo-excited precursor molecules and on the resulting fragmentation rates upon interaction with secondary electrons. These studies will link incident photon energy with resulting deposition rate aiming on improved energy-selective FXBID. Further investigations on precursor-substrate interactions and in-situ purification techniques (e.g, co-dosing of reactive gases, annealing, hot substrate etc.), will define optimum experimental conditions for fabrication of pure metallic deposits with interesting electronic and/or magnetic properties. High-resolution Fresnel zone plates will be used to evaluate the resolution limit of FXBID. Finally, the properties of FXBID nanostructures and their overall limits will be investigated in detail.The proposed project addresses several open issues on the scientific basics of FXBID and will demonstrate its potential as an alternative to established nanofabrication techniques.