Selective-area fabrication of bulk metallic glass nanowires on silicon

Abstract

• Metallic glass nanowires can be selectively patterned on silicon. • Inexpensive Al foil masks can generate wide range of nanopatterned areas. • Size and shape of nanostructures in selective areas can be readily tailored. • The approach has potential for nanowire-based microfluidic devices. We report a facile technique to fabricate metallic nanowires on selective areas on silicon. Nanowires are fabricated by thermoplastic drawing of bulk metallic glass from microscale cavities etched in silicon. The metallic nanowires are formed only on selective areas by using aluminum foil masks. The mask restricts the flow of bulk metallic glass to predefined openings during thermoplastic processing and enables the formation of nanowires on selective areas on silicon. We show that nanowires with different aspect-ratios can be formed by tailoring the drawing conditions without changing the silicon. Inexpensive aluminum masks can produce a wide range of nanopatterned areas in the size range of 200 µm and larger.