Growth and low temperature photoluminescence of silicon nanowires for different catalysts

We report the growth of silicon nanowires (SiNWs) by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) with several catalysts. We performed low temperature photoluminescence (PL) experiments on as-grown SiNWs for the following catalysts: Au, Cu, TiSi, PdSi and PtSi. Nanowires are chemically treated with an aqua regia solution to remove the catalyst droplets, this step is followed by a thermal oxidation process. We compared the PL of as-grown and processed SiNWs for each catalyst.