Bandgap shift by quantum confinement effect in ⟨100⟩ Si-nanowires derived from threshold-voltage shift of fabricated metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors and theoretical calculations

Si-nanowire (Si-NW) MOSFETs, the cross-sectional size (square root of the cross-sectional area of NWs) of which was changed from 18 to 4 nm, were fabricated and characterized. Both n- and p-channel MOSFETs have shown a nearly ideal subthreshold swing of 63 mV/decade. The threshold voltage of n-/p-channel MOSFETs has gradually increased/decreased with decreasing the cross-sectional size. The bandgap shift from bulk Si has been derived from the threshold-voltage shift. The bandgap of Si-NWs was calculated by a density functional theory, tight binding method, and effective mass approximation. The calculated bandgap shows good agreement with that derived from threshold voltage. The theoretical calculation indicates that the bandgap is dominated by the cross-sectional size (area) and is not very sensitive to the shape within the aspect-ratio range of 1.0-2.5. (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3559265]