Nano manufacturing of a small-tipped stylus for measurement of micro-machine elements with concave surfaces

The purpose of this research is to manufacture a new small-tipped stylus for measurement of micro machine elements with concave shapes. It is very difficult to measure surfaces of concave shapes because its overhanging part becomes the obstacle against measurement. We need to develop a small tipped stylus to be able to reach the position to be measured. In machining process, one of the photolithography technique is applied: the combination of the electron-beam exposure and the etching process of a silicon chip. In this paper, a preferable stylus shape is proposed and the trial manufacturing of the stylus has been performed with wet etching and dry deep reactive ion etching (DRIE). Several process conditions of etching and resultant shapes of manufactured styli are investigated and evaluated with SEM observation. The difficulty of achieving adequate etched features is shown especially due to the degree of under-etch phenomena.