Growth kinetics of silicon nanowires by platinum assisted vapour–liquid–solid mechanism

The growth kinetics of Si nanowires produced by a vapour–liquid–solid (VLS) mechanism in conjunction with Pt and Au catalysts, respectively, was investigated and compared. Pt was employed as a VLS catalyst for single-crystal Si nanowires in a SiCl4-based chemical vapour deposition process. The growth rates were higher with Pt than with Au under all processing conditions. The activation energy was measured as 80 and 130 kJ/mol with the Pt and Au catalysts, respectively. The present results suggest that the rate-determining step is the incorporation of Si atoms in the lattice at the liquid/solid interfaces and, furthermore, the metal catalysts affect this step, resulting in different activation energy.