A novel approach for piezoresistivity characterization of silicon nanowires

A new measurement approach for high precision characterization of piezoresistance in silicon nanowires (SiNWs) is presented. No dedicated silicon chips with embedded piezoresistors are needed, but the wafer containing the NWs are simply diced in cantilever shaped dies. A conventional cascade probe station and a Thorlabs´ manual translation stage are used for the measurements. By measuring the resistance change with and without deflection, the piezoresistive coefficient of NWs with different lengths is extracted. The extracted longitudinal pizeoresistive coefficient π_l[110] along <;110>; are reported. The highest value, 188×10-11 Pa^-1, is reported for the 8 μm long NWs.