HOLOGRAPHIC NANO-LITHOGRAPHY OF SEMICONDUCTORS WITH THE X-RAY LASER

QUANTUM CONFINED STRUCTURES SUCH AS SUPERLATTICES AND QUANTUM "WIRES" AND "DOTS" ARE THE FOCUS OF MUCH CURRENT RESEARCH BOTH FOR NEW PHYSICS AND NEW TECHNOLOGY. THESE APPROACHES PERTURB THE ELECTRONIC STATES OF THE SOLID IN AN ESSENTIAL WAY. WEAK PERTURBATIONS CAN BE ACHIEVED BY USE OF SURFACE GRATING STRUCTURES. SUCH STRUCTURES USING CURRENT TECHNOLOGY ARE LIMITED TO GRATING PERIODS OF 100 NM OR MORE, COMPARED TO ELECTRON WAVELENGTHS OF ABOUT 10 NM. THE USE OF A SOFT X-RAY LASER AS A COHERENT LIGHT SOURCE AT 18.2 NM WILL PERMIT PERIODS AS SMALL AS 20 NM, OPENING A NEW DOMAIN OF INVESTIGATION. IN PHASE I, WE PROPOSE ESTABLISHING THE VALIDITY OF THE APPROACH BY USING THIS LASER TO PERFORM A YOUNG "TWO-SLIT" EXPERIMENT USING FAST, FINE GRAINED X-RAY FILM AS RECORDING MEDIUM. PHASE II WILL MOVE THE TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPED TO PHOTORESIST AND THE PRODUCTION OF HOLOGRAPHIC GRATINGS TO BE PLACED FIRST ON SI MOSFETS AND SUBSEQUENTLY TO GAAS/ALGAAS HETEROSTRUCTURES AND QUANTUM WELLS, WHERE WE WILL MEASURE ELECTRON TRANSPORT PROPERTIES. WE ANTICIPATE THAT PHASE II WILL RESULT IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF PATENTABLE NOVEL APPLICATIONS AND THUS TO SET THE STAGE FOR PHASE III.