Nanostripe-Confined Catalyst Formation for Uniform Growth of Ultrathin Silicon Nanowires

Uniform growth of ultrathin silicon nanowire (SiNW) channels is the key to accomplishing reliable integration of various SiNW-based electronics, but remains a formidable challenge for catalytic synthesis, largely due to the lack of uniform size control of the leading metallic droplets. In this work,...

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Published inNanomaterials (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 13; no. 1; p. 121
Main Authors Cheng, Yinzi, Gan, Xin, Liu, Zongguang, Wang, Junzhuan, Xu, Jun, Chen, Kunji, Yu, Linwei
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Switzerland MDPI AG 26.12.2022
MDPI
Subjects
Analysis
Catalysts
Chemical synthesis
confined catalyst formation
Droplets
Field effect transistors
Gas flow
in-plane solid–liquid–solid growth
Indium
Mechanical properties
Methods
Nanoparticles
Nanotechnology
Nanowires
Nucleation
Plasma etching
Scanning electron microscopy
Semiconductor devices
Sensors
Silicon
silicon nanowires
Silicon wafers
China
silicon nanowires
confined catalyst formation
in-plane solid–liquid–solid growth
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Summary:Uniform growth of ultrathin silicon nanowire (SiNW) channels is the key to accomplishing reliable integration of various SiNW-based electronics, but remains a formidable challenge for catalytic synthesis, largely due to the lack of uniform size control of the leading metallic droplets. In this work, we explored a nanostripe-confined approach to produce highly uniform indium (In) catalyst droplets that enabled the uniform growth of an orderly SiNW array via an in-plane solid-liquid-solid (IPSLS) guided growth directed by simple step edges. It was found that the size dispersion of the In droplets could be reduced substantially from Dcatpl = 20 ± 96 nm on a planar surface to only Dcatns = 88 ± 13 nm when the width of the In nanostripe was narrowed to Wstr= 100 nm, which could be qualitatively explained in a confined diffusion and nucleation model. The improved droplet uniformity was then translated into a more uniform growth of ultrathin SiNWs, with diameter of only Dnw= 28 ± 4 nm, which has not been reported for single-edge guided IPSLS growth. These results lay a solid basis for the construction of advanced SiNW-derived field-effect transistors, sensors and display applications.
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ISSN:2079-4991
2079-4991
DOI:10.3390/nano13010121