Molecular Quantum Lithography

Molecular Quantum Lithography

Surface-deposition of single molecules on the nanometer scale is important in nanotechnology and even single molecules are expected to serve as functional elements in nanoelectronics, nanooptics, nanomechanics and nanoquantumoptics.

The quantum wave nature of massive objects is already nowadays routinely used to shape and characterize materials on the nanoscale, e.g. in electron microscopy, neutron diffraction or atom interferometry.

Here we demonstrate quantum interference lithography with fullerene C60 molecules. Molecular quantum fringes are generated in a miniaturized Talbot-Lau interferometer and deposited onto a reconstructed Si(111) 7x7 surface.

Scanning tunneling microscopy allows us to image both the atomic background and the deposited molecules with single-particle resolution.