Title : 
Effect of annealing on the conductivity of electroless deposited Ni nanowires and films
         
        
            Author : 
Mani, Sathya ; Saif, Taher ; Han, Jong H.
         
        
            Author_Institution : 
Dept. of Mech. & Ind. Eng., Univ. of Illinois, Urbana, IL
         
        
        
        
        
            fDate : 
3/1/2006 12:00:00 AM
         
        
        
        
            Abstract : 
We examined the effect of annealing on the conductivity of electroless deposited nickel nanowires and nanofilms. The electroless deposited nanowires were 50-200-nm thick and a few micrometers long. TEM analysis of the wires revealed that they have a bead-like (50 nm in size) structure. On annealing, in a nonoxidizing environment, the beads coalesced to form contiguous wires. Four-point resistance measurements of the nickel nanowires showed that annealed wires have considerably lower resistivity than nonannealed wires. In-situ resistance measurement of Ni nanofilms, during annealing, showed an exponential decay of resistance with temperature. The drop in resistance is thought to be a result of bead coalescence and grain-boundary attrition. After annealing, the resistivity showed a linear dependence on temperature, with the slope indicative of the electron-phonon interaction
         
        
            Keywords : 
annealing; electrical conductivity; electrical resistivity; electroless deposited coatings; electron-phonon interactions; grain boundaries; metallic thin films; nanowires; nickel; transmission electron microscopy; 50 to 200 nm; Ni; TEM; annealing; bead coalescence; bead-like structure; electrical conductivity; electroless deposited nanofilms; electroless deposited nanowires; electron-phonon interaction; four-point resistance; grain-boundary; in-situ electrical resistivity; nonoxidizing environment; transmission electron microscopy; Annealing; Conductive films; Conductivity measurement; Dielectric substrates; Electrical resistance measurement; Fabrication; Gold; Nanowires; Nickel; Wires; Annealing; four-point; in-situ; nanowires; nickel; resistivity;
         
        
        
            Journal_Title : 
Nanotechnology, IEEE Transactions on
         
        
        
        
        
            DOI : 
10.1109/TNANO.2006.869662