Fabricating Metallic Nanoclusters for Use in Photonics, Medical and Electronic Applications

NanoInk has harnessed the ability of Dip Pen Nanolithography^® (DPN^®) technology to deposit materials with nanoscale precision, to develop a technique for fabricating metallic nanoclusters. In this application note, NanoInk’s nanolithography systems were used to pattern sub-micron sized droplets of a mixture of metal salt in P₂VP-PEO onto a SiO₂ substrate. The printed surface was then heat treated to decompose the polymer and oxidize the metal ions, creating arrays of metal oxide nanoclusters. It concludes that the DPN fabrication process is a reliable method for creating clusters of nanomaterials in regular arrays on a silicon oxide surface.