Monolithic growth of ultra-thin Ge nanowires on Si(001)

Abstract

Self-assembled Ge wires with a height of only 3 unit cells and a length of up to 2 micrometers were grown on Si(001) by means of a catalyst-free method based on molecular beam epitaxy. The wires grow horizontally along either the [100] or the [010] direction. On atomically flat surfaces, they exhibit a highly uniform, triangular cross section. A simple thermodynamic model accounts for the existence of a preferential base width for longitudinal expansion, in quantitative agreement with the experimental findings. Despite the absence of intentional doping, first transistor-type devices made from single wires show low-resistive electrical contacts and single hole transport at sub-Kelvin temperatures. In view of their exceptionally small and self-defined cross section, these Ge wires hold promise for the realization of hole systems with exotic properties and provide a new development route for silicon-based nanoelectronics.

23 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (4)

• Signatures of Majorana fermions in hybrid superconductor-semiconductor nanowire devices
• Majorana Fermions and a Topological Phase Transition in Semiconductor-Superconductor Heterostructures
• One-Dimensional Hole Gas in Germanium/Silicon Nanowire Heterostructures
• An initial phase of Ge hut array formation at low temperature on Si(001)

Cited by in corpus (29)

• Silicon Quantum Electronics
• The germanium quantum information route
• Ge hole spin qubit
• Ultrafast coherent control of a hole spin qubit in a germanium quantum dot
• Direct Rashba spin-orbit interaction in Si and Ge nanowires with different growth directions
• Circuit QED with Hole-Spin Qubits in Ge/Si Nanowire Quantum Dots
• Heavy hole states in Germanium hut wires
• Majorana Fermions in Ge/Si Hole Nanowires
• Recent advances in hole-spin qubits
• Tunable g factor and phonon-mediated hole spin relaxation in Ge/Si nanowire quantum dots
• Self-controlled growth of highly uniform Ge/Si hut wires for scalable qubit devices
• Single-shot readout of hole spins in Ge
• Ballistic one-dimensional holes with strong g-factor anisotropy in germanium
• Anisotropic g-Factor and Spin-Orbit Field in a Ge Hut Wire Double Quantum Dot
• Gate-Tunable Spin-Orbit Coupling in a Germanium Hole Double Quantum Dot
• Single and Double Hole Quantum Dots in Strained Ge/SiGe Quantum Wells
• Zero field splitting of heavy-hole states in quantum dots
• Dipole coupling of a tunable hole double quantum dot in germanium hut wire to a microwave resonator
• Fast Hole Tunneling Times in Germanium Hut Wires Probed by Single-Shot Reflectometry
• Electrical control of the hole spin qubit in Si and Ge nanowire quantum dots
• Hole spin in tunable Ge hut wire double quantum dot
• Strongly Interacting Holes in Ge/Si Nanowires
• Assessing the potential of Ge/SiGe quantum dots as hosts for singlet-triplet qubits
• On atomic structure of Ge huts growing on the Ge/Si(001) wetting layer
• 3D Nanostructures on Ge/Si(100) Wetting Layers: Hillocks and Pre-Quantum Dots
• Entropy controlled fully reversible nanostructure formation of Ge on miscut vicinal Si (001) surfaces
• Low-symmetry nanowire cross-sections for enhanced Dresselhaus spin-orbit interaction
• Scalable and Tunable In-Plane Ge/Si(001) Nanowires Grown by Molecular Beam Epitaxy
• Supercurrent and multiple Andreev reflections in Ge hut nanowire Josephson Junctions