Novel materials and processes for lithography and nanotechnology

The astonishing material properties of living systems arise from the bottom-up self-organization of matter with sub-nanometer scale precision. Shape and function are defined by chemistry.;As with living systems, the properties, of man-made materials are also dependent on the packing and self-organization of matter. However, humans can also control the shape and properties of matter using top-down approaches. As humanity's ability to control the structure and organization of matter with greater and greater precision improves, so does our control over the properties of the materials we produce.;Lithography is a general process by which materials can be shaped and chemically modified in arbitrary patterns in a top-down fashion. This process is used in the fabrication of all computer chips as well as many other sophisticated devices.;In this thesis I discuss both the top-down and bottom-up approach to the fabrication of materials with dimensions on the nanometer length scale as well as progress towards the combining of these two approaches to create materials with novel and potentially useful properties.;In the first chapter, I briefly describe two widely used approaches to conventional lithography in order to illustrate several fundamental principles and to explain the motivation for the use of 157 nm exposure radiation.;In the second chapter, I discuss some of the limitations of conventional lithography and describe an alternative patterning approach know as surface growth lithography.;In the third chapter, I introduce the concept of using chemistry to control the shape of molecules. Specifically, dendronization is used to change the conformation of a linear polymer from a random coil to a rigid rod based on steric repulsion between dendrons.;In the fourth chapter, I explore the use of scanning force microscopy to visualize individual dendronized polymer molecules.;In the fifth chapter, I report the development of a scanning force microscopy (SFM) approach to selectively deposit materials on a surface with nanometer scale precision.;In the sixth chapter, I illustrate the extension of the aforementioned surface activation technique to pattern gold nanoparticles onto a surface with nanometer scale resolution. (Abstract shortened by UMI.).