Excited states and quantum confinement in room temperature few nanometre scale silicon single electron transistors

Single nanometre scale quantum dots (QDs) have significant potential for many 'beyond CMOS' nanoelectronics and quantum computation applications. The fabrication and measurement of few nanometre silicon point-contact QD single-electron transistors are reported, which both operate at room temperature (RT) and are fabricated using standard processes. By combining thin silicon-on-insulator wafers, specific device geometry, and controlled oxidation, <10 nm nanoscale point-contact channels are defined. In this limit of the point-contact approach, ultra-small, few nanometre scale QDs are formed, enabling RT measurement of the full QD characteristics, including excited states to be made. A remarkably large QD electron addition energy ∼0.8 eV, and a quantum confinement energy ∼0.3 eV, are observed, implying a QD only ∼1.6 nm in size. In measurements of 19 RT devices, the extracted QD radius lies within a narrow band, from 0.8 to 2.35 nm, emphasising the single-nanometre scale of the QDs. These results demonstrate that with careful control, 'beyond CMOS' RT QD transistors can be produced using current 'conventional' semiconductor device fabrication techniques.