3D structuring of polymers and metals at sub-wavelength scales by direct laser writing for photonic and sensing applications
Résumé
Fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) nanostructures has received increasing attention due to their potential application in many exemplified areas of research such as Photonics (photonic crystals, metamaterials, photonic ring resonators, diffractive optics), Micro Optics (micro optical devices, integrated optics), Micro Fluidics (lab-on-a-chip systems, development of substances, analysis), Life Sciences (extra cellular matrices, stem cell differentiation, cell growth studies, tissue engineering) and Nano- and Microtechnology. So far, the fabrication of three-dimensional structures with feature sizes far beyond the diffraction limit of the applied laser wavelength is a great challenge in photolithography and associated fields. In that context, we investigate physical approaches (near field illumination, Two Photon Absorption,…) coupled to chemical non-linearity effects in order to confine the matter/light interaction volume. In this paper, we show that nanostructures (polymers, metals or hybrid materials) could be fabricated by laser assisted photochemical routes with sub-100 nm feature sizes (lambda/18).