551 research outputs found
Internal Stresses and Formation of Switchable Nanowires at Thin Silica Film Edge
At vertical edges, thin films of silicon oxide (SiO_{2-x}) contain
semiconductive c-Si layered nanocrystals (Si NC) embedded in and supported by
an insulating g-SiO2 matrix. Tour et al. have shown that a trenched thin film
geometry enables the NC to form switchable nanowires (SNW) when trained by an
applied field. The field required to form SNW decreases rapidly within a few
cycles, or by annealing at 600 C in even fewer cycles, and is stable to 700C.
Here we describe the intrinsic evolution of Si NC and SNW in terms of the
competition between internal stresses and electro-osmosis. The analysis relies
heavily on experimental data from a wide range of thin film studies, and it
explains why a vertical edge across the planar Si-SiOx interface is necessary
to form SNW. The discussion also shows that the formation mechanisms of Si NC
and Si/SiO_{2-x} SNW are intrinsic and result from optimization of nanowire
conductivity in the presence of residual host misfit stresses
On the nature of the stretched exponential photoluminescence decay for silicon nanocrystals
The influence of hydrogen rate on optical properties of silicon nanocrystals deposited by sputtering method was studied by means of time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy as well as transmission and reflection measurements. It was found that photoluminescence decay is strongly non-single exponential and can be described by the stretched exponential function. It was also shown that effective decay rate probability density function may be recovered by means of Stehfest algorithm. Moreover, it was proposed that the observed broadening of obtained decay rate distributions reflects the disorder in the samples
ANNA Tool: A Way to Connect Future and Past Students in STEM
The 'Increasing Gender Diversity in STEM' project involved six different partner universities around Europe. The scope of the project was to investigate the gender difference in self-perception of students in relation to their career choice. This was done through a web-based app, ANNA tool, that allows high school students to match their own personality, views, and expectations to those of engineering students and professional engineers. In the meantime, the data collection gave the opportunity to take a look at how students perceive their university and undergraduate program. This pilot application is then been further studied in order to analyse its scalability in other countries with broader STEM content
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