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Abstract:
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Conventional lithographic approaches are good at fabricating structures on the top surfaces of substrates . They are not suited for 3D surface patterning due to the fact that vertical radiation exposure is employed to transfer patterns . In the meanwhile , patterns generated on 3D surfaces , such as the vertical sidewalls of silicon channels and the irregular surfaces of glass micropipettes may provide valuable applications in microfluidics , 3D circuits , bioengineering and so on . In this work , we developed new approaches to produce metal micropatterns on the vertical sidewalls of silicon channels as well as to fabricate two separated metal microlines on the tips of glass micropipettes . Using these approaches 10 µm Au dots and 20 -µm -wide Au lines have been successfully produced on the sidewalls and two separated microlines have been fabricated on the outer surface of a glass micropipette with tip size down to 5 µm . In the meantime , it was found in our experiments that ZnO nanowires may contact each other and become linked during hydrothermal growth . This phenomenon might be useful for building novel nanostructures . Accordingly , we monitored the process of nanowires growth and explained the formation of two types of linked nanowires . |