Site-Controlled Uniform Ge/Si Hut Wires with Electrically Tunable Spin-Orbit Coupling

Semiconductor nanowires have been playing a crucial role in the development of nanoscale devices for the realization of spin qubits, Majorana fermions, single photon emitters, nanoprocessors, etc. The monolithic growth of site-controlled nanowires is a prerequisite toward the next generation of devices that will require addressability and scalability. Here, combining top-down nanofabrication and bottom-up self-assembly, the growth of Ge wires on prepatterned Si (001) substrates with controllable position, distance, length, and structure is reported. This is achieved by a novel growth process that uses a SiGe strain-relaxation template and can be potentially generalized to other material combinations. Transport measurements show an electrically tunable spin-orbit coupling, with a spin-orbit length similar to that of III-V materials. Also, charge sensing between quantum dots in closely spaced wires is observed, which underlines their potential for the realization of advanced quantum devices. The reported results open a path toward scalable qubit devices using nanowires on silicon.