Scanning Probe Microscopy (SPM) [1] has been an important tool to
organize matter on the nanometer scale. It has been proved to be a
powerful tool not only for imaging but also for nanofabrication.
SPM-based nanofabrication comprises manipulation of atoms or molecules
and SPM-based nanolithography. SPM-based nanolithography, referred to as
scanning probe lithography (SPL) holds good promise for fabrication of
nanometer-scale patterns as an emerging generic lithography technique
that employs SPM to directly pattern nanometer-scale features under
appropriate conditions. The water meniscus formation between the tip and
the flat substrate, due to the water layer present on any surface of a
material at ambient conditions, has been studied experimentally and
theoretically [2-6] using SPM techniques. The water effect in the
imaging process is well understood [2, 4, 6-8]. Dip pen nanolithogaphy
(DPN) [9] is one example of a technique that uses the water effect to
transfer material from the tip onto sample surface in direct-write
fashion with nanoscopic resolution.