title: Step-shaped bismuth nanowires with metal-semiconductor junction characteristics.
abstract: Uniform and step-shaped Bi nanowire (NW) arrays have been synthesized by electrochemical deposition inside the uniform and step-shaped nanochannels of an anodic aluminium oxide template. These Bi NWs are highly oriented and single crystalline. The current-voltage characteristics of the parallel uniform Bi nanowires show that the contacts between Bi NWs and gold film do not make significant contributions to the I-V characteristics of the step-shaped Bi NWs. The diameters of the thick segment and the thin segment of the step-shaped Bi NWs are about 70 and 40 nm, respectively. Their current-voltage characteristics show conventional metal-semiconductor junction behaviour. The approach can be exploited to produce one-dimensional metal-semiconductor junctions using step-shaped NWs consisting of other semi-metals without any external doping, which may find various applications in nanotechnology.
authors: Key Laboratory of Materials Physics, Institute of Solid State Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, PO Box 1129, Hefei, Anhui 230031, People's Republic of China.
authors: Y T
authors: YT
authors: Tian
authors: G M
authors: GM
authors: Meng
authors: G Z
authors: GZ
authors: Wang
authors: F
authors: F
authors: Phillipp
authors: S H
authors: SH
authors: Sun
authors: L D
authors: LD
authors: Zhang