Dewetting of resist/metal bilayers in resist stripping processes

We report the observations of dewetting of resist/metal bilayers in a resist stripping process of nanofabrication in O2 plasma. The initiation of the dewetting process is tentatively associated with local heating caused by surface plasmon induced in metallic nanoparticles or nanowires. The surface patterns thus formed differ substantially from all the dewetting patterns reported so far, and they resemble trees at micrometer scale. The possible mechanism for the formation of this kind striking patterns is discussed and its implication to future nanoelectronics manufacturing is addressed.