Coherent Diffraction Imaging of Single 95nm Nanowires

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the use of coherent diffraction imaging to determine the 3D shape of single silicon nanowires smaller than 100 nm with 28 nm resolution, highlighting its potential for nanostructure analysis.

Contribution

It introduces a novel application of coherent diffraction imaging for 3D shape reconstruction of individual nanowires at sub-100 nm scale.

Findings

Achieved 28 nm resolution in shape recovery

Successfully reconstructed the hexagonal shape of nanowires

Discussed radiation damage limits of the method

Abstract

Photonic or electronic confinement effects in nanostructures become significant when one of their dimension is in the 5-300 nm range. Improving their development requires the ability to study their structure - shape, strain field, interdiffusion maps - using novel techniques. We have used coherent diffraction imaging to record the 3-dimensionnal scattered intensity of single silicon nanowires with a lateral size smaller than 100 nm. We show that this intensity can be used to recover the hexagonal shape of the nanowire with a 28nm resolution. The article also discusses limits of the method in terms of radiation damage.