| The research presented in this dissertation examines the incorporation, nanopatterning and characterization of atomic layer deposited (ALD) films on existing and new materials, motivated by relevance to current Si microelectronics technology and to inform future efforts beyond Si. ALD provides two key benefits. First, the atomic monolayer precision and conformal nature of ALD growth provides an ease of integration with non-planar and complex substrates, and architectures, which is found to be increasingly relevant to microelectronics and nanotechnology in general. In addition, surface templating permits spatially selective ALD growth, enabling three-dimensional surface engineering of materials. Surface templating strategies relying on atomic force microscope (AFM) nanopatterning and self-assembled monolayers are investigated.;Control over ALD growth was first demonstrated on Si by tuning the surface hydroxyl concentration via hydroxylation, hydrogenation, and alkylation with organic self-assembled monolayers. The differences in ALD nucleation on these surfaces were exploited to achieve selective ALD by spatially defining hydroxyl regions via AFM field induced oxidation.;Graphene, though promising as an electronic material, is highly hydrophobic and inert. Control over surface chemistry and lithographic engineering of graphene is therefore crucial for incorporation with complementary electronic materials. First, surface modification of graphene was demonstrated with conductive AFM (cAFM) nanopatterning. cAFM nanopatterning locally oxidizes epitaxial graphene, with the oxidation kinetics dependent on the surface, interface, and bulk structure of epitaxial graphene. This surface functionalization by cAFM nanopatterning enabled the selective growth of ALD ZnO. Next, non-covalent organic self- assembled monolayers was used to seed the growth of ALD high- k dielectric films on graphene, an important challenge to the realization of graphene-based field effect transistors. A suite of characterization techniques showed that the ALD grown dielectrics were smooth, uniform, conformal and had good dielectric properties, while the underlying graphene remained intact. Finally, one-dimensional organic monolayers were used for directed ALD growth on graphene by the preferential interaction of ALD precursors with its functional groups. ALD precursor reactions with the monolayer template were either self-terminating or non-terminating. Retention of the monolayer ordering following ALD was dependent on monolayer stability, which can be enhanced via crosslinking. |
