High Aspect Ratio Machining of Nanocarbon Materials by Reactive Ion Etching
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High Aspect Ratio Machining of Nanocarbon Materials by Reactive Ion Etching Atsuko Sekiguchi†, Don N. Futaba†, Takeo Yamada†, Kenji Hata† † CNT-Application Research Center, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Tsukuba, 305-8565, JAPAN Abstract We demonstrate anisotropic, vertical deep etching of graphite and densely packed carbon nanotube (CNT) thick layer beyond the micrometer scale, which representing the first step toward nanocarbon bulk micromachining. This micromachining process is compatible with standard lithography and therefore allows the fabrication of graphite and CNT architectures with 1 µm lateral resolution and up to 10 µm scale depth. Introduction Nanocarbon materials, represented by graphene, graphite and carbon nanotubes (CNT), could serve as an excellent material for Micro Electro Mechanical System (MEMS), because they are light, strong, stiff, electrically conducting, and possess high surface area. Over the course of the past 20 years, many interesting and innovative MEMS devices have been demonstrated.1-6 Utilizing the low dimensional nature and unique properties of the material could open new directions for rational devices not demonstrated by silicon. However, from a practical standpoint, a MEMS device assembled from an individual CNT or a single layer of graphene is severely limited. Similar to the case of silicon, reactive ion etching of nanocarbon materials is expected to open up many opportunities beyond the surface nanocarbon MEMS. However, vertical lithographic etching of CNTs and graphite beyond micrometer scale has not been demonstrated thus far. For example, anisotropic etching of graphene,7 highly ordered pyrolytic graphite (HOPG), glassy carbon,8 and carbon nanowalls9 have been reported, however; the etch rate are only 11.4 nm/min for HOPG, 39 nm/min for glassy carbon, and 250nm/min for nanowalls. In this paper, we have investigated how the etching conditions influence the accuracy of patterning and damages on the samples. Here we utilize the inductive coupled plasma reactive ion etching (ICP-RIE). It is possible to generate the plasma with low density by applying low voltage bias, which is suited to prevent the etching damage. We demonstrate anisotropic, vertical deep etching of graphite and densely packed CNT thick layers beyond the micrometer scale therefore representing the first step toward nanocarbon bulk micromachining. These micromachining processes are compatible with standard lithography and allow the fabrication of graphite and CNT architectures with 1 µm lateral resolution and up to 10 µm in depth. Besides, it is also demonstrated that the process is applicable to the composite of CNTs and fluorinated rubber.
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Experiment Materials The CNTs were synthesized from Al2O3 (40nm)/Fe (1.5nm) catalysts sputtered o
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