Amorphous silicon nanowires (a-SiNW's) with average diameter around 20 nm were synthesized at about 950 deg C under an Ar/H_2 atmosphere on large area of a (111) Si substrate without supplying any gaseous or liquid Si sources. The Si substrate, deposited with a layer of Ni of about 40 nm thick, served itself as a silicon source for the growth of the a-SiNWs. Different from the well-known vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) for conventional whisker growth, it was found that growth of the a-SiNWs was controlled by a solid-liquid-solid mechanism, which is analogous to the VLS model.
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