A Novel Approach for Atomic-Scale Manufacturing via Enzymatic Hydrolysis Machining

Optics, semiconductors, and quantum technologies require atomic-scale manufacturing capabilities. However, the challenge lies in discovering or applying phenomena distinct from conventional macroscopic processes to realize atomic-scale and damage-free material removal. By employing biological enzymatic hydrolysis, an atomic-scale and abrasive-free machining technique, enzymatic hydrolysis machining (EHM), is proposed. Enzymatic hydrolysis regenerates abundant hydroxyl groups on the polymer surface, enabling the atomic-scale removal of Si through C–O–Si bridging bond formation and shearing. Static incubation experiments confirm the enzymatic hydrolysis effect, with hole/crack formation and carbonyl intensity reduction directly verifying ester bond scission. The removal depth of Si using polybutylene succinate (PBS) in pure water was 16.4 nm after 12 h, whereas it increased to 213.5 nm when Humicola insolens cutinase (HiC) was used. Pad-type and wheel-type tools obtain W-shaped and Gaussian-like removal functions for polishing and figuring, respectively. The volume removal rate was 3.8 × 10 −5 mm 3 ⋅min −1 . EHM effectively achieved an atomically smooth Si surface (Sq = 0.05 nm, 5 μm × 5 μm viewing area). The generality of EHM is demonstrated by extending it to other materials (SiO 2 , 4H-SiC, and GaN). Furthermore, numerically controlled EHM was applied to a 100 mm × 50 mm Si mirror, achieving a uniform atomically smooth surface across the entire area. This work shows that EHM is a novel and effective technique for atomic-scale manufacturing.