CHARACTERIZATION OF LIGHT-EMITTING SILICON NANOPILLARS PRODUCED BY LITHOGRAPHY AND ETCHING

Silicon nanopillars were produced by using deep-UV lithography, fluori ne based highly anisotropic silicon etching and further thinning by hi gh temperature thermal or chemical oxidation and oxide removal. The ob tained structures were fully characterized by scanning and transmissio n electron microscopy, electron diffraction, atomic force microscopy a nd X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. It was verified that the obtained nanopillars by the above process are of perfect crystallinity, the bo ttom silicon surface on which they lie is very smooth and that minor s urface contamination by carbon or oxygen is present on both the bottom silicon surface and the surface surrounding the nanopillars. The obta ined luminescence peak is in the red-green spectral region.