• 한국전산유체공학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2007.04a
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• pp.153-158
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• 2007

Since the introduction of Nanoimprint in the mid-1990s, Nanoimprint lithography, a low-cost, non-convential method, has been the dominant lithography technology that guarantees high-throughput patterning of nanostructures. Based on the mechanical embossing mechanism, Nanoimprint lithography creates the nanopatterns on the polymer material cast on the substrate. In essence, the process needs nanofabrication equipment for printing with the adequate control of temperature, pressure and control of parallels of the stamp and substrate. This article introduce the possibility and reality of the thermal control on the hot plate using a CFD code. Numerical computation has been conducted for assessing the feasibility of a hot plate($120{\times}120\;mm2$). PID control is adopted to ensure high temperature uniformity in several zones. Parallel experiments have also been performed for verifying thermal performance. Not only show the results the optimum number of thermocouples related to controllers but also suggest that the thermal simulation using a CFD code would be an alternative method to design and develop the thermal control equipment in the financial aspect.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Technology Engineers
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.245-250
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• 2011

An UV/thermal hybrid nanoimprint lithography system was designed and implemented for the pattern transfer to flexible substrates. This system can utilize a plate stamp, roll stamp, and film stamp. For all cases of using those stamps, this system is also switchable an UV or thermal nanoimprint lithography mode. This paper shows how to design the heating and UV curing plates and proposes how to change them easily. Because the pressure condition and the speed of the press roller varies by the characteristics of the stamp and substrate, all the parameters related to the nanoimprint lithography have to adjustable. Some transferred patterns are shown in this paper to verify the performance of the hybrid nanoimprint lithography system. The flexible substrates with nano-scale patterns on them will be key components for next generation technologies such as flexible displays, bendable semi-conductors, and solar cells.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Technology of Plasticity Conference
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.325-328
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• 2008

With intensive research and development to mass particular nanostructure of 10nm, Nanoimprint lithography will soon be put to practical use. This paper reviews latest research and application trend and also covers technical articles about Nanoimprint lithography technology Published since 1998, including statistical analysis of collected data(Web of Science DB) and related technical trend.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.29-34
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• 2010

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is an emerging technology enabling cost effective and high throughput nanofabrication. To successfully imprint a nanometer scale patterns, the understanding of the mechanism in nanoimprint forming is essential. In this paper, a numerical analysis of polymer flow in thermal NIL was performed. First, a finite element model of the periodic mold structure with prescribed boundary conditions was established. Then, the volume of fluid (VOF) and grid deformation method were utilized to calculate the free surfaces of the polymer flow based on an Eulerian grid system. From the simulation, the velocity fields and the imprinting pressure for constant imprinting velocity in thermal NIL were obtained. The velocity field is significant because it can directly describe the mode of the polymer deformation, which is the key role to determine the mechanism of nanoimprint forming. Effects of different mold shapes and various thicknesses of polymer resist were also investigated.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.28 no.12
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• pp.1419-1424
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• 2011

Nanoimprint lithography is a next generation lithography technology, which enables to fabricate nano to micron-scale patterns through simple and low cost process. Nanoimprint lithography has been applied in various industry fields such as light emitting diodes, solar cells and display. Functional patterns, including anti-reflection moth-eye pattern, photonic crystal pattern, fabricated by nanoimprint lithography are used to improve overall efficiency of devices in that fields. For these reasons, in this study, sub-micron-scaled functional patterns were directly fabricated on Si and glass substrates by thermal imprinting process using ZnO nano-particles dispersion resin. Through the thermal imprinting process, arrays of sub-micron-scaled pillar and hole patterns were successfully fabricated on the Si and glass substrates. And then, the topography, components and optical property of the imprinted ZnO nano-particles/resin patterns are characterized by Scanning Electron Microscope, Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and UV-vis spectrometer, respectively.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.20-26
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• 2008

Nanoimprint lithography(NIL) is becoming next generation lithography of significant interest due to its low cost and a potential patterning resolution of 10nm or less. Success of the NIL relies on the adequate conditions of pressure, temperature and time. To have the adequate conditions for NIL, one has to understand the polymer flowing behavior during the imprinting process. In this paper, an analytical approach of polymer flow in thermal NIL was performed based on the squeeze flow with partial slip boundary conditions. Velocity profiles and pressure distributions of the polymer flow were obtained and imprinting forces and residual thickness were predicted with the consideration of the slip velocity between the polymer and the mold/substrate. The results show that the consideration of the slip is very important for investigating the polymer flow in Thermal NIL.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.89-94
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• 2011

In recent years there have been considerable attentions on nanoimprint lithography (NIL) by the display device and semiconductor industry due to its potential abilities that enable cost-effective and high-throughput nanofabrication. A major disadvantage of thermal NIL is the thermal cycle, that is, heating over glass transition temperature and then cooling below it, which requires a significant amount of processing time and limits the throughput. One of the methods to overcome this disadvantage is to improve the cooling performance in NIL process. In this paper, a numerical analysis model of cooling system in thermal NIL was development by CAD/CAE program and the performance of the cooling system was analyzed by the model. The calculated temperatures of nanoimprint device were verified by the measurements. By using the analysis model, the case that the cooling material is replaced by liquid nitrogen is investigated.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.93-98
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• 2013

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is a next generation technology for fabrication of micrometer and nanometer scale patterns. There have been considerable attentions on NIL due to its potential abilities that enable cost-effective and high-throughput nanofabrication to the display device and semiconductor industry. To successfully imprint a nanosized pattern with the thermal NIL, the process conditions such as temperature and pressure should be appropriately selected. This starts with a clear understanding of polymer material behavior during the thermal NIL process. In this paper, a filling process of the polymer resist into nanometer scale cavities during the thermal NIL at the temperature range, where the polymer resist shows the viscoelastic behaviors with consideration of stress relaxation effect of the polymer. In the simulation, the filling process and the residual layer formation are numerically investigated. And the effects of pressure and temperature on NIL process, specially the residual layer formation are discussed.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.74-80
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• 2016

This study presents a thermal device specially designed for thermal nanoimprint lithography equipments, which requires the capability of rapid heating and cooling, high temperature uniformity and the material strength to endure high stamping pressure. The proposal to meet these requirements is a planar-type hot plate extensible to a large area, in which long circular cartridge heaters and heat pipes are installed inside in parallel. The heat pipes are connected to the outside water cooling chamber. A hot plate made of stainless steel is fabricated with a dimension $240mm{\times}240mm{\times}20mm$. Laboratory experiments are conducted to examine the thermal performance of the hot plate. The results illustrate that the employment of heat pipes leads to a notable enhancement of temperature uniformity in the device and provides an efficient heat delivery from the hot plate to outside. It is verified that the suggested hot plate could be a feasible thermal tool for thermal nanoimprint lithography, satisfying the major design requirements.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.15-20
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• 2013

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is the next generation photolithography process in which the photoresist is dispensed onto the substrate in its liquid form and then imprinted and cured into a desired pattern instead of using traditional optical system. There have been considerable attentions on NIL due to its potential abilities that enable cost-effective and high-throughput nanofabrication to the display device and semiconductor industry. In this paper, a pressure vessel type imprinting system was used to imprint patterns with two type pressure values (25 bar, 30 bar) and two type pressure keeping times (5 min, 10 min). The height of transferred pattern and the thickness of residual layer were measured and effects of pressurization conditions - pressure and pressure keeping time - on the pattern transfer in thermal NIL were investigated.