Freestanding silicon nanocrystals with extremely low defect content

The future exploitation of the exceptional properties of freestanding silicon nanocrystals (Si-NCs) in marketable applications relies upon our ability to produce large amounts of defect-free Si-NCs by means of a low-cost method. Here, we demonstrate that Si-NCs fabricated by scalable RF plasma-assisted decomposition of silane with additional hydrogen gas injected into the afterglow region of the plasma exhibit immediately after synthesis the lowest reported defect density, corresponding to a value of only about 0.002-0.005 defects per NC for Si-NCs with 4 nm in size. In addition, the virtually perfect hydrogen termination of these Si-NCs yields an enhanced resistance against natural oxidation in comparison to Si-NCs with nearly one order of magnitude larger initial defect density. solid-gas-reaction, liquid-phase synthesis, laser pyrolysis of laser