Templating water stains for nanolithography.

Herein, a nanoscale patterning technique is demonstrated for creating twin features in polymers and metals. The process works by combining evaporative staining with a templating process. Well-ordered hexagonally arrayed double rings were fabricated using hydrophobic spherical templates. The diameter of the rings, the width of individual rings, and the spacing between concentric and adjacent rings could be tuned by varying the solution conditions. Arrays could be made without the outer ring by employing hydrophilic templates.