Soft lithography

In technology, soft lithography is a family of techniques for fabricating or replicating structures using "elastomeric stamps, molds, and conformable photomasks". It is called "soft" because it uses elastomeric materials, most notably PDMS.

Soft lithography is generally used to construct features measured on the micrometer to nanometer scale. According to Rogers and Nuzzo (2005), development of soft lithography expanded rapidly from 1995 to 2005. Soft lithography tools are now commercially available.

Types

 * PDMS stamp
 * Microcontact printing
 * Multilayer soft lithography
 * Nanosphere lithography
 * Patterning by etching at the nanoscale

Advantages
Soft lithography has some unique advantages over other forms of lithography (such as photolithography and electron beam lithography). They include the following:
 * Lower cost than traditional photolithography in mass production
 * Well-suited for applications in biotechnology
 * Well-suited for applications in plastic electronics
 * Well-suited for applications involving large or nonplanar (nonflat) surfaces
 * More pattern-transferring methods than traditional lithography techniques (more "ink" options)
 * Does not need a photo-reactive surface to create a nanostructure
 * Smaller details than photolithography in laboratory settings (~30 nm vs ~100 nm). The resolution depends on the mask used and can reach 6 nm.