Abstract
We report on the fabrication and modification of a top-down nanofabrication platform for enormous parallel silicon nanowire-based devices. We explain the nanowire formation in detail, using an additive hybrid lithography step, optimising a reactive ion etching recipe for obtaining smooth and vertical nanowires under a hybrid mask, and embedding the nanowire in a dielectric membrane. The nanowires are used as a sacrificial template, removal of the nanowires forms arrays of well-defined nano-pores with a high surface density. This platform is expected to find applications in many different physical domains, including nanofluidics, (3D) nanoelectronics, as well as nanophotonics. We demonstrate the employment of the platform as field emitter arrays, as well as a state-of-the-art electro-osmotic pump.
Highlights
Crystalline vertical silicon nanowires (SiNW), referred to as silicon nano-pillars, are already known as key building blocks for ultrahigh density electronic integrated circuits
An example is by embedding the SiNWs in a dielectric ceramic material, typically low-stress silicon-rich silicon nitride (SiRN), that can be deposited through low-pressure chemical vapour deposition (LPCVD) [5]
Further processing may imply etching of silicon in a reactive ion etching (RIE) process directly to acquire SiNWs at the full-wafer-scale, or by performing additive hybrid lithography to confine the nanodot pattern to appointed locations yielding functional device areas
Summary
Crystalline vertical silicon nanowires (SiNW), referred to as silicon nano-pillars, are already known as key building blocks for ultrahigh density electronic integrated circuits. Since the SiNWs are fabricated from a single crystal, they can be machined by a combination of anisotropic etching and self-aligned nano-patterning techniques such as corner lithography [6,7]. We refer to this combination as crystallographic nanolithography [8]. We introduce an alternative fabrication route for single-crystalline high density (1.6 × 109 cm–2) SiNW devices, based on the combination of displacement Talbot lithography (DTL), novel additive hybrid lithography, and nanoscale reactive ion etching (RIE) in a mixed-mode RIE process at non-cryogenic temperature, using fluor(carbon)-chemistry for etching and passivation. Microfluidic pumps are used in many fields including healthcare, science, measurement equipment and future chip cooling [14,15]
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