Patterning and Photosensitive Polymers

A special issue of Polymers (ISSN 2073-4360).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 April 2014) | Viewed by 25094

Special Issue Editor

Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Potsdam, 14476 Potsdam-Golm, Germany
Interests: thin functional polymer films; photosensitive polymer films; microscopy and spectroscopy of macromolecules and nano-objects at interfaces

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Azobenzene-containing photosensitive films are intriguing multi-component systems that consist of polymer matrices modified with azobenzene groups. Under UV-irradiation, the azobenzene can undergo a reversible photo-isomerization from a trans- to a cis- state. This transition alters not only the physico-chemical properties of the azobenzene molecules themselves, but can also trigger a mechanical response within the polymer matrix the azobenzenes are embedded in.

The azobenzene-modified polymers play an important role in modern photonic, electronic, and opto-mechanical applications. They are successfully used to produce a variety of materials for reversible and irreversible micro- and nano-patterning, microlens arrays, plasmonic sensors, light-driven artificial muscles, and light-powered electrical switches. One key phenomenon, common to many applications, is the formation of so-called surface relief gratings (SRG) upon irradiation with an interference pattern. The resulting deformation patterns of the polymer films correspond with the irradiation’s variation of intensity or polarization, and occur at room temperature when azobenzene polymers are supposed to be in a glassy, solid state. The physical origin of this phenomenon has yet to be fully elucidated, and microscopic theories need to be devised that can connect to larger length scales.

This Special Issue aims at reviewing the current state-of-the-art concerning photosensitive azobenzene-containing polymer films, and at developing perspectives for future directions of research. The subjects to be addressed include: theories concerning azobenzene-containing polymers, photosensitive polymer brushes, photosensitive thin polymer films, the patterning of photosensitive polymers, the interaction of surface plasmons with photosensitive polymer films, the application of photosensitive polymer films, etc.

Prof. Dr. Svetlana Santer
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • azobenzene-containing polymer films
  • photosensitive polymer brushes
  • surface relief grating
  • photo-alignment and photo-deformation
  • sub-diffraction patterning
  • computer modeling of photo-induced effects
  • theoretical approaches to photo-patterning

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

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Article
Comparison of in Situ and ex Situ Methods for Synthesis of Two-Photon Polymerization Polymer Nanocomposites
by Qingchuan Guo, Reza Ghadiri, Thomas Weigel, Andreas Aumann, Evgeny L. Gurevich, Cemal Esen, Olaf Medenbach, Wei Cheng, Boris Chichkov and Andreas Ostendorf
Polymers 2014, 6(7), 2037-2050; https://doi.org/10.3390/polym6072037 - 14 Jul 2014
Cited by 122 | Viewed by 14455 | Correction
Abstract
This article reports about nanocomposites, which refractive index is tuned by adding TiO2 nanoparticles. We compare in situ/ex situ preparation of nanocomposites. Preparation procedure is described, properties of nanocomposites are compared, and especially we examine the applicability of two-photon polymerization [...] Read more.
This article reports about nanocomposites, which refractive index is tuned by adding TiO2 nanoparticles. We compare in situ/ex situ preparation of nanocomposites. Preparation procedure is described, properties of nanocomposites are compared, and especially we examine the applicability of two-photon polymerization (2PP) of synthesized nanocomposites. All prepared samples exhibit suitable optical transparency at specific laser wavelengths. Three-dimensional structures were generated by means of two-photon polymerization effect induced by a femtosecond laser. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Patterning and Photosensitive Polymers)
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Article
Injection Compression Molding of Replica Molds for Nanoimprint Lithography
by Keisuke Nagato
Polymers 2014, 6(3), 604-612; https://doi.org/10.3390/polym6030604 - 05 Mar 2014
Cited by 16 | Viewed by 10138
Abstract
As a breakthrough in the cost and durability of molds for nanoimprint lithography (NIL), replica molds are fabricated by injection compression molding (ICM). ICM is commonly used for optical disks such as DVDs or Blu-ray disks and is also a practical fabrication method [...] Read more.
As a breakthrough in the cost and durability of molds for nanoimprint lithography (NIL), replica molds are fabricated by injection compression molding (ICM). ICM is commonly used for optical disks such as DVDs or Blu-ray disks and is also a practical fabrication method for nanostructures. In this paper, I successfully demonstrated the fabrication of cycloolefin polymer replica molds with structures smaller than 60 nm by ICM. Furthermore, ultraviolet (UV)-NIL using these replica molds was demonstrated. UV-cured resist was replicated over an area of 60 mm diameter. The degree of replication by UV-NIL in the first usage of each replica mold had good repeatability. Because ICM is a high-throughput, low-cost process, the replica mold can be disposed of after a certain time for UV-NIL. This method leads to a high-integrity UV-NIL process of patterned media because multiple large-area replica molds can be fabricated simultaneously. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Patterning and Photosensitive Polymers)
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