Fabrication and characterization of silicon nanowires with triangular cross section

Fabrication processes for silicon nanowires with triangular cross section are presented. Processes based on high resolution electron beam lithography and anisotropic etching have been developed on silicon on insulator substrates. As shown by numerical simulations, the triangular shape of the wire allows strong reduction of the dimensions by successive oxidation steps. Moreover, it is easy to define a gate on top of the wire that wraps the device and, with the back gate silicon substrate, allows the biasing of the structure on all sides. The conduction through the wire, as a function of the gate bias and for different temperatures, is reported and discussed. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.