Letter abstract
Nature Nanotechnology 1, 186 - 189 (2006)
Published online: 26 November 2006 | doi:10.1038/nnano.2006.133
Subject Categories: Nanomaterials | Synthesis and processing
Epitaxial growth of silicon nanowires using an aluminium catalyst
Yewu Wang1,2, Volker Schmidt1,2, Stephan Senz1 & Ulrich Gösele1
Abstract
Silicon nanowires have been identified as important components for future electronic and sensor nanodevices1. So far gold has dominated as the catalyst for growing Si nanowires via the vapour–liquid–solid (VLS) mechanism2, 3, 4, 5. Unfortunately, gold traps electrons and holes in Si and poses a serious contamination problem for Si complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) processing. Although there are some reports on the use of non-gold catalysts6, 7, 8, 9 for Si nanowire growth, either the growth requires high temperatures and/or the catalysts are not compatible with CMOS requirements. From a technological standpoint, a much more attractive catalyst material would be aluminium, as it is a standard metal in Si process lines. Here we report for the first time the epitaxial growth of Al-catalysed Si nanowires and suggest that growth proceeds via a vapour–solid–solid (VSS) rather than a VLS mechanism. It is also found that the tapering of the nanowires can be strongly reduced by lowering the growth temperature.
- Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics, Weinberg 2, 06120 Halle, Germany
- These authors contributed equally to this work
Correspondence to: Yewu Wang1,2 e-mail: yewuwang@mpi-halle.mpg.de
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