Device fabrication with solid–liquid–solid grown silicon nanowires

Abstract

High quality, single-crystal silicon nanowires were successfully grown from silicon waferswith a nickel catalyst by utilizing a solid–liquid–solid (SLS) mechanism. The nanowireswere composed of a crystalline silicon core with an average diameter of 10 nm anda thick outer oxide layer of between 20 and 30 nm at a growth temperature of1000 °C. When utilizing the SLS growth mechanism, the diameter of the silicon nanowire isdependent solely upon the growth temperature, and has no relation to either the size or theshape of the catalyst. The characteristics of the silicon nanowires are highly dependentupon the properties of the silicon substrate, such as the crystal phase of silicon itself, aswell as the doping type. The possibility of doping of silicon nanowires grown viathe SLS mechanism without any external dopant source was demonstrated bymeasuring the electrical properties of a silicon nanowire field effect transistor.