Development of Roll Metal Mold by Synchrotron Radiation

Embossing roll processing is one of various highly efficient processing methods for continuously printing a pattern designed on the surface of a roll onto sheets and plates. Efforts to apply the embossing roll processing method to the fabrication of micro components have drawn attention recently. This paper details our study to produce a micro patterned embossing roll with a 3D X-ray lithography process. More specifically, the outer surface of a cylindrical steel roll (12 mm in diameter) was coated with photo resist, and 3D X-ray lithography with synchrotron radiation was employed to fabricate a hole-shaped pattern (approx. 10 mum in diameter) on the outer surface. The outer surface of the roll was then plated with copper to fabricate copper dots (each approx. 10 mum in diameter), which were used as etching masks to perform wet etching on the roll. Consequently, we were able to fabricate a structure whose outer surface is dotted with numerous microstructures. However, edge of the pattern part that was masked by copper was underetched, and the expected shape was not able to obtain. Then, we examined the possibility of the processing by the verification of the problem of a wet etching, and the dry etching