Plasma Synthesis of Silicon Nanoparticles: From Molecules to Clusters and Nanoparticle Growth

• Published in: IEEE open journal of nanotechnology Vol. 3; pp. 94 - 100
• Main Authors: Nunomura, Shota, Kamataki, Kunihiro, Nagai, Takehiko, Misawa, Tatsuya, Kawai, Shinji, Takenaka, Kosuke, Uchida, Giichiro, Koga, Kazunori
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 2022; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Atomic structure; Chemical synthesis; Coagulation; Discharges (electric); Electrodes; High energy electrons; lithium ion battery; Lithium-ion batteries; Nanoparticles; Nanotechnology; Plasmas; Polymerization; quantum dots; Semiconductor devices; silane plasmas; Silicon; Silicon nanoparticles; Solar cells; Thin films
• ISSN: 2644-1292; 2644-1292
• DOI: 10.1109/OJNANO.2022.3209995

Plasma nanotechnology is widely used for nanoscale etching, dopant implantation and thin-film deposition for state-of-the-art semiconductor devices. Such a plasma nanotechnology has another interesting aspect of synthesizing nanoparticles, in a controlled manner of atomic composition, structure and those size. Here, we present the polymerization and growth of silicon nanoparticles from a molecular level to 10 nm-particles in hydrogen diluted silane plasmas. The polymerization and growth are experimentally studied using various plasma diagnostic tools. The results indicate that nanoparticles are rapidly formed via gas-phase reactions in a low-density plasma comprising high-energy electrons. The growth kinetics and the modification of plasma properties are discussed in terms of gas-phase reactions, charging and coagulation of nanoparticles.