Characterization of light emitting silicon nanopillars produced by lithography and etching

Silicon nanopillars were produced by using deep-UV lithography, fluorine based highly anisotropic silicon etching and further thinning by high temperature thermal or chemical oxidation and oxide removal. The obtained structures were fully characterized by scanning and transmission electron microscopy, electron diffraction, atomic force microscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. It was verified that the obtained nanopillars by the above process are of perfect crystallinity, the bottom silicon surface on which they lie is very smooth and that minor surface contamination by carbon or oxygen is present on both the bottom silicon surface and the surface surrounding the nanopillars. The obtained luminescence peak is in the red-green spectral region.