Self-catalytic growth of horizontal and straight Si nanowires on Si substrates using a sputter deposition technique

We report on the growth of horizontal and straight Si nanowires (NWs) on Si substrate using sputter deposition of the Si layer followed by thermal annealing at 1000 °C and above. The growth of horizontal NWs was achieved without the use of any metal catalyst. Uniform cylindrical shaped Si NWs with a diameter in the range of 50–60 nm and a length of up to 8 μm were synthesized. The as-synthesized Si NWs have a Si core covered with a thin amorphous native oxide layer, as revealed by high resolution transmission electron microscopy. The aspect ratio of these Si NWs is in the range of 100–160. Micro-Raman studies on the NWs reveal a tensile strain on the Si NW core due to presence of a thin oxide layer. From the Raman shift, we calculate a strain of 1.0% for the catalyst free Si NW. FTIR analysis indicates the presence of interstitial oxygen atoms in the Si NWs, as expected from oxidation of Si NWs. For comparison, metal catalyst (Au) assisted Si NWs have also been grown on Si(100) substrate by a similar process. These NWs have a similar diameter and a marginally higher aspect ratio. A model for the growth mechanism of horizontal NWs is presented. This represents one of the first examples of direct horizontal growth of straight Si NWs on commonly used Si substrates suitable for nanoelectronic device fabrication.     

Morphology of Si nanowires fabricated by laser ablation using gold catalysts

Si nanowires (NWs) were fabricated successfully by laser ablation using Au as catalyst. Si wafers were used as the collector. The diameters of Si NWs ranged from 20 to 150 nm. Different forms of Si NWs were observed at different local sites inside a furnace: Si NWs with a high aspect ratio of length to diameter, Si NWs with defects and Si NWs with Au-containing nanoparticles being embedded. Especially, a nano-particle embedded Si NW is a new nanostructure that is observed for the first time. PACS 81.07.-b; 81.07.Bc; 81.16.-c; 81.20.-n     

Growth and properties of InGaAs nanowires on silicon

Free‐standing ternary InGaAs nanowires (NW) are at the core of intense investigations due to their integration capabilities on silicon (Si) for next‐generation photovoltaics, integrated photonics, tunneling devices, and high‐performance gate all‐round III–V/Si NW transistors. In this review, recent progress on the growth, structural, optical and electrical properties of InGaAs NWs on Si substrate is highlighted. Particular focus is on a comparison between conventional catalyst‐assisted and catalyst‐free growth methods as well as self‐assembled versus site‐selectively grown NW arrays. It will be shown that catalyst‐free, high‐periodicity NW arrays with extremely high compositional uniformity are mandatory to allow un‐ambiguous structure–property correlation measurements. Here, interesting insights into the electronic/optical properties of wurtzite, zincblende and mixed crystal phases of InGaAs will be highlighted based on recent photoluminescence spectroscopy data. Finally, the InGaAs NW‐on‐Si system is also discussed in the realms of heterojunction properties, providing a promising system for steep‐slope tunneling field effect transistors in future low‐power post‐CMOS intergrated microelectronics and broad‐band photoabsorption and detec‐tion devices. (© 2014 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Critical diameters and temperature domains for MBE growth of III–V nanowires on lattice mismatched substrates

We report on the growth properties of InAs, InP and GaAs nanowires (NWs) on different lattice mismatched substrates, in particular, on Si(111), during Au‐assisted molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). We show that the critical diameter for the epitaxial growth of dislocation‐free III–V NWs decreases as the lattice mismatch increases and equals 24 nm for InAs NWs on Si(111), 39 nm for InP NWs on Si(111), 44 nm for InAs NWs on GaAs(111)B, and 110 nm for GaAs NWs on Si(111). When the diameters exceed these critical values, the NWs are dislocated or do not grow at all. The corresponding temperature domains for NW growth extend from 320 °C to 340 °C for InAs NWs on Si(111), 330 °C to 360 °C for InP NWs on Si(111), 370 °C to 420 °C for InAs NWs on GaAs(111)B and 380 °C to 540 °C for GaAs NWs on Si(111). Experimental values for critical diameters are compared to the previous findings and are discussed within the frame of a theoretical model. (© 2009 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Controlling growth density and patterning of single crystalline silicon nanowires

This study examines the usage of well-patterned Au nanoparticles (NPs) as a catalyst for one-dimensional growth of single crystalline Si nanowires (NWs) through the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) mechanism. The study reports the fabrication of monolayer Au NPs through the self-assembly of Au NPs on a 3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane (APTMS)-modified silicon substrate. Results indicate that the spin coating time of Au NPs plays a crucial role in determining the density of Au NPs on the surface of the silicon substrate and the later catalysis growth of Si NWs. The experiments in this study employed optical lithography to pattern Au NPs, treating them as a catalyst for Si NW growth. The patterned Si NW structures easily produced and controlled Si NW density. This approach may be useful for further studies on single crystalline Si NW-based nanodevices and their properties.     

Carrier injection at silicide/silicon interfaces in nanowire based-nanocontacts

In this article, we investigate the silicide/Si nanowire (Si NW) interface properties based on a detailed characterization of PtSi/NW nanocontacts. For that purpose, we fabricate two-terminal structures implemented on vertical Si NWs arrays defined by a top-down approach with an ultra-high density. Each termination of Si NWs is silicided and contacted to an external metal line. The temperature dependence and the non-linearity of current–voltage (I–V) characteristics are identified as a clear signature indicating that contacts dominate the overall resistance of the Si NW arrays. It is demonstrated that this trend remains valid in the limit of extremely small NW radii and that trap-induced surface depletion also reduces the contact injection cross-section. In this context, the electrostatic landscape at the vicinity of the silicide-to-semiconductor contact interface is dominated by the field effect imposed by peripheral surface states and not by the Schottky barrier height.     

From Si nanowire to SiC nanotube

Si nanowires (NWs), with diameters of about 800 nm and lengths of about 10 ??m, previously synthesized by the VLS method with gold catalyst, were carburized at 1,100 °C under methane for conversion into SiC nanostructures. These experiments have shown that Si NWs have been transformed into SiC nanotubes (NTs) with approximately the same sizes. Nanotubes?? sidewall thickness varies from 20 to 150 nm depending on the NTs?? height. These SiC nanotubes are hexagonal in shape and polycrystalline. A model of growth based on the out-diffusion of Si through the SiC layer was proposed to explain the transformation from Si nanowires to SiC nanotubes. This model was completed with thermodynamic calculations on the Si?CH₂?CCH₄?CO₂ system and with results from complementary experiment using propane precursor. Routes for obtaining crystalline SiC NTs using this reaction are proposed.     

Growth and characterization of straight InAs/GaAs nanowire heterostructures on Si substrate

Vertical InAs/GaAs nanowire (NW) heterostructures with a straight InAs segment have been successfully fabricated on Si (111) substrate by using AlGaAs/GaAs buffer layers coupled with a composition grading InGaAs segment. Both the GaAs and InAs segments are not limited by the misfit strain induced critical diameter. The low growth rate of InAs NWs is attributed to the AlGaAs/GaAs buffer layers which dramatically decrease the adatom diffusion contribution to the InAs NW growth. The crystal structure of InAs NW can be tuned from zincblende to wurtzite by controlling its diameter as well as the length of GaAs NWs. This work helps to open up a road for the integration of high-quality III-V NW heterostructures with Si.     

Simulation of growth of silicon nanowhiskers with Ge-Si heterojunctions

The process of formation of Si-Ge heterostructures based on nanowhiskers (NWs) grown according to the vapor-liquid-solid mechanism is studied using the Monte Carlo simulation. It is found that, during growth of axial heterojunctions (HJs), it is impossible to obtain an atomically flat Si-Ge HJ, which is related to a gradual change in the catalyst-drop composition during the switch between fluxes. The dependence of the composition of the Ge _x Si_{1 − x} transition layer on the ratio of fluxes and on the Ge and Si deposition time is studied. It is found that the width of the axial Si-Ge HJs depends on the NW diameter. It depends linearly on the diameter under the adsorption-induced growth conditions and decreases with increasing diameter under the diffusion-induced growth conditions. This means that, as the NW thickness decreases, abrupt HJs in the Ge-Si system can be obtained only in the case of chemical-vapor-deposition growth in which the diffusion-induced growth component is insignificant.     

Controllable hydrothermal synthesis of ZnO nanowires arrays on Al-doped ZnO seed layer and patterning of ZnO nanowires arrays via surface modification of substrate

ZnO nanowire (NW) arrays are assembled on the Al-doped ZnO (AZO) seed layer by a hydrothermal process. Effects of the temperature and growth time of the hydrothermal process on morphological and photoluminescence properties of the as-assembled ZnO NW arrays are characterized and studied. Results indicate that the length and diameter of the ZnO NWs increase with a lengthening of the growth time at 80 °C and the hydrothermal temperature has a significant effect on the growth rate and the photoluminescence properties of the ZnO NW arrays. The patterned AZO seed layer is fabricated on a silicon substrate by combining a sol-gel process with an electron-beam lithography process, as well as a surface fluorination technique, and then the ZnO NW arrays are selectively grown on those patterned regions of the AZO seed layer by the hydrothermal process. Room-temperature photoluminescence spectra of the patterned ZnO NW arrays shows that only a strong UV emission at about 380 nm is observed, which implies that few crystal defects exist inside the as-grown ZnO NW arrays.     

Direct observation of elemental segregation in InGaN nanowires by X‐ray nanoprobe

Using synchrotron radiation nanoprobe, this work reports on the elemental distribution in single In_x Ga_1–xN nanowires (NWs) grown by molecular beam epitaxy directly on Si(111) substrates. Single NWs dispersed on Al covered sapphire were characterized by nano‐X‐ray fluorescence, Raman scattering and photoluminescence spectroscopy. Both Ga and In maps reveal an inhomogeneous axial distribution inside sin‐ gle NWs. The analysis of NWs from the same sample but with different dimensions suggests a decrease of In segregation with the reduction of NW diameter, while Ga distribution seems to remain unaltered. Photoluminescence and Raman scattering measurements carried out on ensembles of NWs exhibit relevant signatures of the compositional disorder. (© 2011 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Light trapping and optical absorption enhancement in vertical semiconductor Si/SiO_2 nanowire arrays

The full potential of optical absorption property must be further cultivated before silicon(Si) semiconductor nanowire(NW) arrays become available for mainstream applications in optoelectronic devices. In this paper, we demonstrate both experimentally and theoretically that an SiO_2 coating can substantially improve the absorption of light in Si NW arrays.When the transparent SiO_2 shell is coated on the outer layer of Si NW, the incident light penetrates better into the absorbing NW core. We provide the detailed theoretical analysis by a combination of finite-difference time-domain(FDTD) analysis.It is demonstrated that increasing the thickness of the dielectric shell, we achieve 1.72 times stronger absorption in the NWs than in uncoated NWs.     

Ordered Si/Si–O nanowire array and its optical properties

Glancing angle deposition (GLAD) has been employed to fabricate the Si/Si–O nanowires (NWs). The perpendicular NW on silicon substrate shows the amorphous nature. The visible light emission from the NWs was observed from the Si/Si–O nanoparticles. High light absorption inside the Si/Si–O NW structure was recorded.     

Synthesis and characterization of Zn3P2/ZnS core/shell nanowires

Fully-surrounded Zn₃P₂/ZnS core/shell nanowires (NWs) were synthesized for the first time via a two-step method: a catalyst free chemical vapor deposition followed by a low-pressure vulcanization process. Field emission scanning electron microscopy, high-resolution transmission electron microscopy, and high-angle angular dark field scanning transmission electron microscopy were used to characterize the morphologies, crystal structure, and element composition of the core/shell NWs. The band structure analysis demonstrates that the Zn₃P₂/ZnS core-shell NW type-II heterostructures have bright potential in photovoltaic nanodevice applications. The core/shell NW growth method used here can be extended to other material system.     

Studies on the nucleation of MBE grown III-nitride nanowires on Si

GaN and AlN nanowires (NWs) have attracted great interests for the fabrication of novel nano-sized devices. In this paper, the nucleation processes of GaN and AlN NWs grown on Si substrates by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) are investigated. It is found that GaN NWs nucleated on in-situ formed Si₃N₄ fully release the stress upon the interface between GaN NW and amorphous Si₃N₄ layer, while AlN NWs nucleated by aluminization process gradually release the stress during growth. Depending on the strain status as well as the migration ability of III group adatoms, the different growth kinetics of GaN and AlN NWs result in different NW morphologies, i.e., GaN NWs with uniform radii and AlN NWs with tapered bases.     

Quantitative analysis of the phonon confinement effect in arbitrarily shaped Si nanocrystals decorated on Si nanowires and its correlation with the photoluminescence spectrum

Arrays of single‐crystalline Si nanowires (NWs) decorated with arbitrarily shaped Si nanocrystals (NCs) are grown by a metal‐assisted chemical etching process using silver (Ag) as the noble metal catalyst. The metal‐assisted chemical etching‐grown Si NWs exhibit strong photoluminescence (PL) emission in the visible and near infrared region at room temperature. Quantum confinement of carriers in the Si NCs is believed to be primarily responsible for the observed PL emission. Raman spectra of the Si NCs decorated on Si NWs exhibit a red shift and an asymmetric broadening of first‐order Raman peak as well as the other multi‐phonon modes when compared with that of the bulk Si. Quantitative analysis of confinement of phonons in the Si NCs is shown to account for the measured Raman peak shift and asymmetric broadening. To eliminate the laser heating effect on the phonon modes of the Si NWs/NCs, the Raman measurement was performed at extremely low laser power. Both the PL and Raman spectral analysis show a log‐normal distribution for the Si NCs, and our transmission electron microscopy results are fully consistent with the results of PL and Raman analyses. We calculate the size distribution of these Si NCs in terms of mean diameter (D₀) and skewness (σ) by correlating the PL spectra and Raman spectra of the as‐grown Si NCs decorated on Si NWs. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

ZnO/TiO2 core–shell nanowire arrays for enhanced dye-sensitized solar cell efficiency

We present a new method of synthesizing ZnO/TiO₂ core–shell nanowire (NW) arrays for the fabrication of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). Vertically aligned ZnO NW arrays were obtained on Si substrates, and modified by a TiO₂ shell in order to solve the recombination problems via a cost-effective spin-coating method. The structure of the ZnO/TiO₂ composite NW arrays was characterized. The experimental results indicate that the TiO₂ shell enhances the performance of the DSSCs, through improving the stability of the ZnO NWs and decreasing the recombination of photogenerated electrons on the NW surface. The highest overall conversion efficiency of the cell reaches about 3.0 %.     

Study of the temperature distribution in Si nanowires under microscopic laser beam excitation

The use of laser beams as excitation sources for the characterization of semiconductor nanowires (NWs) is largely extended. Raman spectroscopy and photoluminescence (PL) are currently applied to the study of NWs. However, NWs are systems with poor thermal conductivity and poor heat dissipation, which result in unintentional heating under the excitation with a focused laser beam with microscopic size, as those usually used in microRaman and microPL experiments. On the other hand, the NWs have subwavelength diameter, which changes the optical absorption with respect to the absorption in bulk materials. Furthermore, the NW diameter is smaller than the laser beam spot, which means that the optical power absorbed by the NW depends on its position inside the laser beam spot. A detailed analysis of the interaction between a microscopic focused laser beam and semiconductor NWs is necessary for the understanding of the experiments involving laser beam excitation of NWs. We present in this work a numerical analysis of the thermal transport in Si NWs, where the heat source is the laser energy locally absorbed by the NW. This analysis takes account of the optical absorption, the thermal conductivity, the dimensions, diameter and length of the NWs, and the immersion medium. Both free standing and heat-sunk NWs are considered. Also, the temperature distribution in ensembles of NWs is discussed. This analysis intends to constitute a tool for the understanding of the thermal phenomena induced by laser beams in semiconductor NWs.     

X-ray investigation of the interface structure of free standing InAs nanowires grown on GaAs [\bar{1}\bar {1}\bar{1}]_{\mathrm{B}}

The heteroepitaxial growth process of InAs nanowires (NW) on GaAs $[\bar{1}\bar{1}\bar{1}]_{\mathrm{B}}$ substrate was investigated by X-ray grazing-incidence diffraction using synchrotron radiation. For crystal growth we applied the vapor–liquid–solid (VLS) growth mechanism via gold seeds. The general sample structure was extracted from various electron microscopic and X-ray diffraction experiments. We found a closed Ga _x In_1?x As graduated alloy layer at the substrate to NW interface which was formed in the initial stage of VLS growth with a Au–Ga–In liquid alloy. With ongoing growth time a transition from this VLS layer growth to the conventional VLS NW growth was observed. The structural properties of both VLS grown crystal types were examined. Furthermore, we discuss the VLS layer growth process.     

Growth parameters and shape specific synthesis of silicon nanowires by the VLS method

In this paper the effect of varying temperature, pressure and chemical precursors on the vapour–liquid–solid (VLS) growth of silicon nanowires (Si NWs) have been investigated. Some aspects of nucleation and growth mechanisms are discussed. Control on Si NW morphology by varying the choice of gaseous precursor (silane or dichlorosilane) at elevated temperatures is reported.