Self-aligned nanowires in tetrahedral amorphous carbon multilayer structures

In this work we combine ion track techniques to construct self-aligned vertical structures with nanometer dimensions. The main idea is to use multilayer targets and apply various etching techniques to create openings along the ion path. By irradiating such a multilayered sample including a tetrahedral amorphous carbon (ta-C) layer and a polymer film on top of the stack with swift heavy ions, the track in the polymer and the electrically conducting track in the ta-C layer are self-aligned and need no extra adjustment. Additional layers, e.g., metals or insulators which are little or not affected by the passage of the ions, can be inserted between the polymer resist and the ta-C film. Two appropriate device applications are proposed: a nano-sized field emission cathode and a two terminal quantum dot structure which might be completed to a transistor by adding a gate terminal.