A METHOD FOR FABRICATING SILICON QUANTUM WIRES BASED ON SIGE SI HETEROSTRUCTURE/

A method for fabricating silicon quantum wires with SiO2 boundaries is presented. It is accomplished by first growing Si/SiGe/Si heterostruc ture on silicon substrate with very low-pressure chemical vapor deposi tion, followed by lithography and reactive ion etching to form trench structures. Finally, the selective chemical etching of SiGe over silic on and subsequent thermal oxidation are carried out to generate expect ed silicon quantum wires. The result observed is demonstrated using sc anning electron microscopy. Furthermore, the thermal oxidation charact eristics of the silicon wires are investigated. The present method pro vides a well-controllable way to fabricate silicon quantum wires and i s fully compatible with silicon microelectronic technology. (C) 1996 A merican Institute of Physics.