Microcontact printing with heavyweight inks

Thioether derivatives with 1-4 thioether moieties were used as inks in micr ocontact printing on gold for the reproduction of patterns as they combine good monolayer quality with synthetic versatility, and high molecular weigh ts. Self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) on gold of compounds 1 and 2 had a qua lity comparable to SAMs of decanethiol, both regarding monolayer order and etch resistance. Etch resistances of SAMs of 3 and 4 were lower. Resulting structures after etching of patterned SAMs using 1, 2, and 3 were of good q uality for patterns with feature sizes on the same stamp ranging from 1-200 mum. Patterns of 4 were not reproduced. Overall, compounds 1 and 2 are goo d candidates for low-diffusion inks.