Photogenerated amines and diamines. Novel curing systems for thin film coatings

The photogeneration of acid within solid matrices such as thin films or coatings has led to significant developments in the areas of photocurable coatings imaging materials and resists for microlithography. In these systems, the ability to photogenerate acid in situ within a solid matrix is key to subsequent steps that may involve polymerization, depolymerization, catalyzed thermolysis or electrophilic aromatic substitution processes. In view of the wealth of chemistry that may be promoted or catalyzed by base and is therefore applicable to coating, imaging, and resist chemistry, it is desirable to prepare efficient organic photo-precursors of amines that may be used efficiently in the solid state. We have developed recently a family of carbamates based on α, α-dimethyl-3,5-dimenthoxybenzyl (Ddz) chemistry that can be used to generate amines by exposure to UV light below 300nm. This report describes some of these carbamates as well as another family of active compounds that may also be used with longer wavelength radiation and possess extremely high quantum efficiencies in the solid state.