Self-assembled growth and enhanced blue emission of SiOxNy-capped silicon nanowire arrays

Abstract

Unique structured SiOxNy-capped Si nanowire arrays were fabricated via electroless metal deposition on α-SiOxNy-covered Si wafer in ionic silver HF solution through selective chemical etching. A self-assembled localized microscopic electrochemical cell model and a diffusion-limited aggregation process are associated with the formation of the SiOxNy-capped Si nanowire arrays. An enhanced blue photoluminescence band has been recorded. Emission and excitation spectral analyses suggest that generation of photoexcited carriers takes place mainly in the quantum confined Si nanowires, whereas their radiative recombination occurs in the Si–N binding states of SiOxNy nanocaps.

Self-organized synthesis of micrometer scale silver disks by electroless metal deposition on Si-incorporated diamond-like carbon films

“…In our previous work, silver capped Si nanowires were found when etching the Si wafer continuously using aforementioned electroless metal deposition method [18][19][20]. This is consistent with galvanic displacement proceeding, because the oxidation and dissolution of the silicon substrate occur selectively and continuously beneath the metal deposits.…”

Metal‐Catalyst‐Free Synthesis and Characterization of Single‐Crystalline Silicon Oxynitride Nanowires

“…However, most of the silicon oxynitride materials studied up to now have a nitrogen concentration less than 15 at.% [8,9], and primarily are amorphous SiO x N y films. As a result, the properties of silicon oxynitride materials with high N concentration remain largely unexplored [10].…”

Carbon-assisted growth and high visible-light optical reflectivity of amorphous silicon oxynitride nanowires

“…However, reports on Si-O-N nanowires were so far rather rare [ 12 - 16 ]. The reported synthesis processes often involved the utilization of transition metals as catalysts in quartz tube furnace for pyrolysis, and sometimes inductively coupled coil was applied to obtain NH 3 plasma for the nanowire growth [ 12 - 15 ].…”

“…These methods are unfavorable due to either the metal contamination to the resulted nanowires or the complicated equipment. Up to now, the optical properties of the Si-O-N nanowires remain largely unexplored, with only blue photoluminescence property recorded in literature [ 13 , 16 ]. In this letter, we develop an inexpensive, easy, repeatable, and catalyst-free method to obtain a kind of amorphous Si-O-N nanowire showing high optical reflectivity in visible-light wavelength, and investigate its growth mechanism.…”