Long-range ordered nanoaperture array with uniform diameter and interpore spacing

Abstract

In application of focused-ion-beam lithography and grazing Ar+ milling on the U-shape barrier layer of anodic alumina nanochannels, we fabricated a hexagonally symmetry aperture array with nominal diameter of 12±2nm and interspacing of 100±2nm. Besides long-range spatial ordering, the focused-ion-beam guided-grown process has also significantly improved uniformity of both the interpore spacing and the aperture size. This aperture array membrane can be applied to the fabrication of nanostructures, such as a lithographic contact mask for ordered quantum-dot array.