The company reveals a process that creates 3D patterns 10nm wide

May 2, 2014 08:09 GMT  ·  By

3D printing usually involves “building” something drop by drop, or “growing” it by curing resin via light exposure. IBM has introduced a new technique, though, one that has a higher resolution and precision than any other currently out there.

You might not have come across any IBM technology capable of creating 3D patterns at a nanoscale level, but that's understandable.

After all, IBM may have come up with the process of chiselling a 10nm, three-dimensional shape into pliable polymer, but it's Zurich startup SwissLitho AG that licensed it. The nanolithography technology is called NanoFrazor.

It was still IBM that demoed it though, and finally brought it to the attention of the world at large, through a partnership with Discovery Kids.

The team-up resulted in a new world record for printing the world's smallest magazine cover ever, featuring the Panda Twins on 11 x 14 micrometers. The original cover was 26.5 x 20.5 cm / 10.43 x 8.07 inches.

NanoFrazor is a play on words, as you might have guessed. Nano is self-explanatory, and Frazor combines the German word frase (milling machine) with the English word “razor.”

So how does it work? The main thing is a nano chisel (700 nanometers long, but just 10 nanometers in radius at its tip) that chips away patterns in the surface of a polymer base.

Running the chisel tip along the pattern after it has cooled can confirm whether or not it came out properly (the accuracy rate of the reading is of less than a nanometer). And unlike other nanoprinting methods, you don't have to wait long to inspect the finished result.

There is a lot of potential for this technology, though it could lead to some really ludicrous fine prints on contracts. After all, as 3DPI rightly points out, you could print an entire novel in the space of a single line on a page. Could be useful for secret and/or coded messages.

Fortunately, text and images are a minor application. The NanoFrazor is expected to be used more in rapid prototyping, creating microchips and microprocessors quickly. One might say it's superior to the normal method of microchip creation, since electron beams are limited to 2D patterns.

The machine could also create 3D patterns that reduce light and data scattering common in microscopic computing structures. This, in turn, would help quantum computer development.

And you don't have to worry about costs either, since the NanoFrazor can be built for $500,000 / €360,000 instead of thrice that sum.