J. Grisolia

A transmission electron microscopy quantitative study of the growth kinetics of H platelets in Si

Proton implantation and thermal annealing of silicon result in the formation of a specific type of extended defects involving hydrogen, named “platelets” or “cavities.” These defects have been related to the exfoliation mechanism on which a newly developed process to transfer thin films of silicon onto various substrates is based. The density and the size of these platelets depend on the implantation and annealing conditions. In this letter, rigorous statistical methods based on transmission electron microscopy have been used to quantitatively study the thermal behavior of these defects. Upon annealing, it is shown that the cavities grow in size, reduce their density, while the overall volume they occupy remains constant. This phenomenon is due to a conservative ripening of the cavities. The transfer of hydrogen atoms from small to large cavities leads to a decrease of the elastic energy within the implanted layer while the strain locally increases around the projected range of the protons.

High-Sensitivity Strain Gauge Based on a Single Wire of Gold Nanoparticles Fabricated by Stop-and-Go Convective Self-Assembly

High-sensitivity strain gauges based on single wires of close-packed 14 nm colloidal gold nanoparticles are obtained by a novel variant of convective self-assembly (CSA). This CSA mode named stop-and-go CSA enables the fabrication of nanoparticle wires only a few micrometers wide, separated by distances that can be easily tuned over tens to hundreds of micrometers. Nanoparticle wires are obtained in a single step by direct deposition of nanoparticles from suspensions onto flexible polyethylene terephthalate films, without any lithographic prepatterning. When connected between two electrodes, such single nanoparticle wires function as miniature resistive strain gauges. The high sensitivity, repeatability, and robustness demonstrated by these single-wire strain gauges make them extremely promising for integration into micro-electromechanical systems or for high-resolution strain mapping.

Formation energies and relative stability of perfect and faulted dislocation loops in silicon

A study of the relative thermal stability of perfect and faulted dislocation loops formed during annealing of preamorphized silicon wafers has been carried out. A series of transmission electron microscopy experiments has been designed to study the influence of the ion dose, the annealing ambient and the proximity of a free surface on the evolution of both types of loops. Samples were implanted with either 150 keV Ge+ or 50 keV Si+ ions to a dose of 2×1015 cm−2 and annealed at 900 °C in N2, N2O, and O2. The calculations of formation energy of both types of dislocation loops show that, for defects of the same size, faulted dislocation loops (FDLs) are more energetically stable than perfect dislocation loops (PDLs) if their diameter is smaller than 80 nm and vice versa. The experimental results have been analyzed within the framework of the Ostwald ripening of two existing populations of interstitial defects. It is found that the defect ripening is nonconservative if the surface is close to the end of range...

Tunable Conductive Nanoparticle Wire Arrays Fabricated by Convective Self-Assembly on Nonpatterned Substrates

Ordered arrays of centimeter-long nanoparticle wires are fabricated by convective self-assembly from aqueous suspensions of 18 nm gold colloids, on flat SiO(2)/Si substrates without any prepatterning. The orientation of the wires can be switched from parallel to perpendicular to the substrate-liquid-air contact line by controlling the substrate temperature. While the wires parallel to the meniscus are obtained by a stick-slip process, a mechanism based on critical density-triggered particle pinning is proposed to explain the formation of wires perpendicular to the meniscus. The geometry of the wire arrays is tuned by simply controlling the meniscus translation speed. Wires are typically characterized by widths of a few micrometers (1.8-8.2 µm), thicknesses of mono- to multilayers (18-70 nm), and spacings of few tens of micrometers. The fabricated nanoparticle wires are conductive, exhibiting a metallic resistive behavior in ambient conditions. Resistivity values of 5 × 10(-6) and 5 × 10(-2) Ωm are obtained on multilayer and monolayer nanoparticle wires, respectively. Such conductive nanoparticle wire arrays, fabricated by a simple and low-cost bottom-up strategy, offer opportunities for developing nanoparticle-based functional devices.

Kinetic aspects of the growth of platelets and voids in H implanted Si

Abstract We have undertaken a systematic and quantitative study of the extended defects formed after high-dose proton implantation in silicon. This study is based on the transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) experiments to “follow” the thermal evolution of platelets and voids for a large variety of annealing conditions up to 900°C. Up to about 500°C, only platelets are observed and, as the anneal proceeds, they grow in size and reduce their density through the conservative exchange of hydrogen (H) atoms. On the contrary, above 500°C, H starts to diffuse out of the defect-rich region and this out-diffusion can be completed after 700°C anneals. Concurrently, platelets tend to disappear and voids appear. Above 700°C anneals, hydrogen cannot be detected anymore in the layers and only voids remain. Upon time, they also grow in size and reduce their density. This is again attributed to the Ostwald ripening of voids which involves now vacancy diffusion from small voids to large ones. In summary, we have shown that platelets and voids both undergo quasi-conservative ripening upon annealing; at low-temperature (LT) platelets exchange the H atoms they are composed of while at high-temperature voids exchange vacancies.

Transport in superlattices of magnetic nanoparticles: coulomb blockade, hysteresis, and switching induced by a magnetic field.

We report on magnetotransport measurements on millimetric super-lattices of Co-Fe nanoparticles surrounded by an organic layer. At low temperature, the transition between the Coulomb blockade and the conductive regime becomes abrupt and hysteretic. The transition between both regime can be induced by a magnetic field, leading to a novel mechanism of magnetoresistance. Between 1.8 and 10 K, high-field magnetoresistance due to magnetic disorder at the surface of the particles is also observed. Below 1.8 K, this magnetoresistance abruptly collapses and a low-field magnetoresistance is observed.

Room-temperature quantum effect in silicon nanoparticles obtained by low-energy ion implantation and embedded in a nanometer scale capacitor

In this article, we present the room-temperature current-voltage characteristics of a nanometer scale (100×100nm2) metal-oxide-semiconductor capacitor containing few (less than 100) silicon nanoparticles. The layer of silicon nanoparticles is synthesized within the oxide of this capacitor by ultra low-energy ion implantation and annealing. Current fluctuations in the form of discrete current steps and sharp peaks appeared in the static and dynamic I(V) characteristics of the capacitor. These features have been associated to quantized charging and discharging of the nanoparticles and the resulting Coulomb interaction to the tunneling current.

Growth mechanism of cavities in MeV helium implanted silicon

A study of silicon implanted with 1.55 MeV helium 3 and thermally annealed to generate a subsurface cavity region was performed using neutron depth profiling and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Results show that about 30% of the initial implanted helium is still present in cavities even after a 900 °C-1 h anneal. In addition, TEM measurement of cavity size on anneal temperature yields an activation energy of 1.65 eV for the growth of cavities. This value is very close to the activation energy (1.7 eV) reported for helium diffusion in silicon. Cavity growth hence results essentially from exchange of helium atoms between cavities.

Kinetic aspects of the growth of hydrogen induced platelets in SiC

Annealing of heavily hydrogen-implanted silicon carbide (SiC) leads to the formation of one specific type of defect: hydrogen induced platelets. These defects may be regarded as two-dimensional precipitates of H atoms stored in a stable configuration. In this article, we have studied the growth kinetics of these platelets upon annealing in the 800–1000 °C range by transmission electron microscopy. We show that the growth of these defects proceeds through the exchange of H atoms with the result that larger ones grow at the expense of the smaller ones during annealing. This process can be described in terms of a conservative Ostwald ripening mechanism. The activation energy for this growth is found to be about 3.4 eV, a value similar to that observed for the “effective” diffusion of H in heavily H-implanted SiC.

99% random telegraph signal-like noise in gold nanoparticle μ-stripes

In this paper, we report on a process to prepare gold nanoparticle stripes on SiO(2) by convective/capillary assembly without any patterning of the substrate. Electrical devices were then fabricated using stencil lithography in order to avoid any contamination. I(V) measurements at room temperature show that these stripes have an ohmic behavior between +/- 0.5 V with a resistivity ranging from one to two orders higher than the gold bulk value. Furthermore, I(V) and I(t) measurements reveal current fluctuations that were interpreted in terms of charging and discharging of nanoparticle islands leading to a very large electrostatic perturbation of current conduction paths. Unconventional relative amplitudes of up to 99% RTS fluctuations were observed.