Fabrication of complex nanostructures of Poly(vinylidenefluoride-trifluoroethylene) by dual step hot-embossing

In this work, complex 3D ferroelectric nanostructures have been successfully fabricated on Poly(vinylidenefluoride-trifluoroethylene), P(VDF-TrFE), thin films using a special hot-embossing process with two sequential shots on the same site with a grating template and a rounded square array template at the same hot-embossing temperature. The nanostructures have been characterized with scanning electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy and piezoresponse force microscopy, respectively. It is shown that sequential hot-embossing offers an effective way to create complex structures for functional ferroelectric materials by conducting secondary or tertiary imprinting toward various applications, including mass production of ferroelectric devices such as nonvolatile memories, photonics, bionic structure and surface wetting. (C) 2011 American Vacuum Society. [DOI: 10.1116/1.3662087]