SI-NANOSTRUCTURES MADE BY LASER-ANNEALING

A method to produce homogeneous arrays of stripes or dots of microcrys talline silicon without the use of masks is presented. Periods down to 210 nm and feature sizes less than 100 nm are demonstrated. For the f irst time, laser fragmentation has been used to generate these pattern s. Electron mobilities of 12 cm(2)/V s were achieved at an electron de nsity of 4.7 X 10(20) cm(-3). Different laser-annealing processes were applied to reduce stress in the obtained structures and to increase t he crystallite size. Additionally oxidation reduces the lateral dimens ions of the structures, as an approach towards the large-area preparat ion of Si quantum dots and wires. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All r ights reserved.