title: Thin Nanoporous Metal-Insulator-Metal Membranes.
abstract: Insulating nanoporous materials are promising platforms for soft-ionizing membranes; however, improvement in fabrication processes and the quality and high breakdown resistance of the thin insulator layers are needed for high integration and performance. Here, scalable fabrication of highly porous, thin, silicon dioxide membranes with controlled thickness is demonstrated using plasma-enhanced chemical-vapor-deposition. The fabricated membranes exhibit good insulating properties with a breakdown voltage of 1 × 10(7) V/cm. Our calculations suggest that the average electric field inside a nanopore of the membranes can be as high as 1 × 10(6) V/cm; sufficient for ionization of wide range of molecules. These metal-insulator-metal nanoporous arrays are promising for applications such soft ionizing membranes for mass spectroscopy.
authors: Institute for Future Environments, School of Chemistry, Physics, and Mechanical Engineering, Queensland University of Technology , Brisbane, QLD 4000, Australia.|School of Physics, the University of Melbourne , Melbourne, VIC 3010, Australia.
authors: Morteza
authors: M
authors: Aramesh
authors: School of Physics, the University of Melbourne , Melbourne, VIC 3010, Australia.
authors: Amir
authors: A
authors: Djalalian-Assl
authors: Manufacturing Flagship, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), PO Box 218, Lindfield, NSW 2070, Australia.
authors: Mir Massoud Aghili
authors: MM
authors: Yajadda
authors: School of Physics, the University of Melbourne , Melbourne, VIC 3010, Australia.
authors: Steven
authors: S
authors: Prawer
authors: Institute for Future Environments, School of Chemistry, Physics, and Mechanical Engineering, Queensland University of Technology , Brisbane, QLD 4000, Australia.|Plasma Nanoscience Laboratories, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) , Lindfield, New South Wales 2070, Australia.
authors: Kostya Ken
authors: KK
authors: Ostrikov
keywords: dielectric breakdown; nanoporous materials; plasma-enhanced chemical-vapor-deposition; silicon dioxide; soft ionizing membrane (SIM)