Preparation, structural and electrical properties of zinc oxide grown on silicon nanoporous pillar array

Polycrystalline thick film of zinc oxide （ZnO） is grown on a unique silicon substrate with a hierarchical structure, silicon nanoporous pillar array （Si-NPA）, by using a vapour phase transport method. It is found that as-grown ZnO film is composed of closely packed ZnO crystallites with an average size of -10 μm. The film resistivity of ZnO/SiNPA is measured to be -8.9Ωcm by the standard four probe method. The lengthwise Ⅰ-Ⅴ curve of ZnO/Si-NPA heterostructure is measured. Theoretical analysis shows that the carrier transport across ZnO/Si-NPA heterojunction is dominated by two mechanisms, i.e. a thermionic process at high voltages and a quantum tunnelling process at low voltages.

Time-Resolved Photoluminescence Study of Silicon Nanoporous Pillar Array

A silicon nanoporous pillar array （Si-NPA） is thought to be a promising functional substrate for constructing a variety of Si-based optoelectronic nanodevices, due to its unique hierarchical structure and enhanced physical properties. This makes the in-depth understanding of the photoluminescence （PL） of Si-NPA crucial for both scientific research and practical applications. In this work, the PL properties of Si-NPA are studied by measuring both the steady-state and time-resolved PL spectrum. Based on the experimental data, the three PL bands of Si-NPA, i.e., the ultraviolet band, the purple-blue plateau and the red band are assigned to the oxygen-excess defects in Si oxide or silanol groups at the surface of Si nanocrystallites （nc-Si）, oxygen deficiency defects in Si oxide, and band-to-band transition of nc-Si under the frame of quantum confinement combining with the surface states like Si=O and Si-O^i bonds at the surface of nc-Si, respectively. These results may provide some novel insight into the PL process of Si-NPA and may be helpful for clarifying the PL mechanism.

Capacitive humidity sensing properties of carbon nanotubes grown on silicon nanoporous pillar array

Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) were grown on silicon nanoporous pillar array (Si-NPA) by thermal chemical vapor deposition method, and the structural and capacitive humidity sensing properties of CNT/Si-NPA were studied. It was found that with the relative humidity (RH) changing from 11% to 95%, a device re-sponse of ~480% was achieved at the frequency of 50000 Hz, and a linear device response curve could be obtained by adopting longitudinal logarithmic coordinate. The response/recovery times were measured to be ~20 s and ~10 s, respectively, which indicated a rather fast response/recovery rate. The adsorption-desorption dynamic cycle experiments demonstrated the high measurement reproducibility of CNT/Si-NPA sensors. These excellent performances were attributed to the unique surface structure, morphology and chemical inertness of CNT/Si-NPA.