242 results about "Afm indentation" patented technology

A method for forming a platen useful for forming nanoscale wires for device applications comprises: (a) providing a substrate having a major surface; (b) forming a plurality of alternating layers of two dissimilar materials on the substrate to form a stack having a major surface parallel to that of the substrate; (c) cleaving the stack normal to its major surface to expose the plurality of alternating layers; and (d) etching the exposed plurality of alternating layers to a chosen depth using an etchant that etches one material at a different rate than the other material to thereby provide the surface with extensive strips of indentations and form the platen useful for molding masters for nano-imprinting technology. The pattern of the platen is then imprinted into a substrate comprising a softer material to form a negative of the pattern, which is then used in further processing to form nanowires. The nanoscale platen thus comprises a plurality of alternating layers of the two dissimilar materials, with the layers of one material etched relative the layers of the other material to form indentations of the one material. The platen is then oriented such that the indentations are parallel to a surface to be imprinted.

The present invention provides an apparatus and method including hardware and software, which allows collecting and analyzing of data to obtain information about mechanical properties of soft materials. This allows surface mapping of viscoelastic properties in a high-resolution and fast manner. It also allows finding the degree of nonlinearity of the material response of the sample during the measurements. The apparatus can be used as a stand-alone device, or an add-on to either the existing atomic force microscope or nanoindenter device.

The present invention relates to materials, methods and apparatuses for performing imprint lithography using amorphous metallic materials. The amorphous metallic materials can be employed as imprint media and thermoplastic forming processes are applied during the pattern transfer procedure to produce micron scale and nanoscale patterns in the amorphous metallic layer. The pattern transfer is in the form of direct mask embossing or through a serial nano-indentation process. A rewriting process is also disclosed, which involves an erasing mechanism that is accomplished by means of a second thermoplastic forming process. The amorphous metallic materials may also be used directly as an embossing mold in imprint lithography to allow high volume imprint nano-manufacturing. This invention also comprises of a method of smoothening surfaces under the action of the surface tension alone.

A toner comprising a toner particle that contains a binder resin and a colorant, wherein (1) an average circularity of the toner is at least 0.960, (2) an onset temperature Tε (° C.) of a storage elastic modulus E′ of the toner, as determined by a powder dynamic viscoelastic measurement, is from 50° C. to 70° C., and (3) in a differential curve obtained by differentiation, by load, of a load-displacement curve provided by measurement of the strength of the toner by a nanoindentation procedure, with the horizontal axis being load (mN) and the vertical axis being displacement (μm), the load X that provides the maximum value in the differential curve in the load region from 0.20 mN to 2.30 mN is from 1.00 mN to 1.50 mN.