Investigation of multi-beam interference under asymmetric exposure conditions

In this paper, the complex patterns of multi-beam interference under asymmetric conditions, i.e. the interfering beams with non-identical amplitude, incidence, azimuth or polarization, were investigated both theoretically and experimentally. The presented interference patterns of various exposure combinations suggest that the change of incidence or azimuth angle affects both the pattern period and shape, while the change of amplitude or polarization does not affect the period at all, but only the pattern shape. This finding should be useful when utilizing holographic lithography to fabricate periodically arranged patterns.