In-Plane Thermal Conductivity of Radial and Planar Si/SiOx Hybrid Nanomembrane Superlattices

Silicon, although widely used in modern electronic devices, has not yet been implemented in thermoelectric applications mainly due to its high thermal conductivity, kappa, which leads to an extremely ldw thermoelectric energy conversion efficiency (figure of merit). Here, we present an approach to manage kappa of Si thin-film-based nanoarchitectures through the formation of radial and planar Si/SiOx hybrid nanomembrane superlattices (HNMSLs). For the radial Si/SiOx HNMSLs with various numbers of windings (1, 2, and 5 windings), we observe a continuous reduction in Ic with increasing number of windings. Meanwhile, the planar Si/SiOx HNMSL, which is fabricated by mechanically compressing a five windings, rolled-up microtube, shows the smallest in-plane thermal conductivity among all the reported values for Si-based superlattices. A theoretical model proposed within the framework of the Born von Karman lattice dynamics to quantitatively interpret the experimental data indicates that the thermal conductivity of Si/SiOx HNMSLs is to a great extent determined by the phonon processes in the SiOx layers.