Heteroepitaxial Growth of Ge Nanowires on Si Substrates

Electron beam evaporation has been used to prepare Ge nanowires (NWs) on top of (111) Si substrates. Despite the non-UHV growth conditions, scanning and transmission electron microscopies demonstrate that NWs are single crystal with specific crystallographic growth directions ([111], [110], and [112]). NWs are faceted, exhibiting the lower energy plans on the surface. The faceting depends on the growth direction. Moreover, the detrimental effects for Ge NWs growth of O atoms contamination are discussed. Finally, we describe how a proper preparation of the Au catalyst is able to increase the Ge NW density by a factor of 4, while heteroepitaxy and faceting features are maintained.