Patent ID: 8387160

Claim:
A lithography system, comprising: an AFM head comprising a cantilever pivotably attached at one end to a support, a probe disposed on an end of the cantilever adapted to be heated; and a resist medium comprising a substrate and a polymer resist layer comprising Diels Alder adducts within which features are produced by thermo-mechanical action of the probe, wherein the polymer resist contains thermally reversible crosslinkages and the probe is configured to thermo-mechanically reverse crosslinkages in the polymer resist layer, wherein the AFM head is configured for both a patterning-mode potential and a read-mode potential, wherein the patterning-mode potential is configured to heat the probe in an amount effective to cause an indentation in the resist medium by local softening of the polymer resist layer, and the read potential-mode is configured to heat the probe to a reading temperature to detect a position of the indentation.