Fabrication of silver nanowires in situ in Si chip based on a novel electrochemical method

In this paper, we report a novel electrochemical deposition (ECD) method to fabricate silver nanoscale wires and dendrites. We carry out the electrochemical deposition (ECD) process on a small piece of Si wafer. On its surface, there are micro-scale predefined silver electrodes. We use organic solution (N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF)) instead of metal salt solution as the electrolyte. Usually the fractal structures can be formed in the electrochemical deposition (ECD) process. When an external resistor is introduced in the ECD circuit, instead of fractal structures, silver nanoscale wires and dendrites can be obtained between two electrodes in situ in the Si chip. The diameters of the silver nanowires are about 40-200 nm and the electric properties of the silver nanowire with a diameter about 100 nm have been measured. We have proposed a possible formation mechanism for these silver nanoscale wires and dendrites.