Near-field scanning optical lithography of PPV for functional devices

We show here for the first time a device manufactured by the technique of near-field scanning optical lithography (NSOL) functioning as an optical device. The technique of NSOL is used to manufacture an optical transmission phase grating (or phase mask) of the semi-conducting polymer poly(p-phenylene vinylene) (PPV), this was done as a proof of concept for device manufacture by this method. Structures on this scale are of interest for integrated optical devices. The phase mask was characterised using AFM and SEM and examined in the context of how well a diffraction pattern matches with theoretical calculations. Some calculations were performed to determine the feasibility of using a similar grating as a component of an all-optical switch. The ablation threshold of PPV was determined to complement the calculations.