Room temperature observation of size dependent single electron tunneling in a sub-2 nm size tunable Pt nanoparticle embedded metal–oxide–semiconductor structure

Abstract

In this paper we report size dependent single electron tunneling behavior at room temperature in a metal-oxide-semiconductor structure with uniformly sized Pt nanoparticles embedded in an Al(2)O(3) dielectric. The sub-2 nm size Pt nanoparticles sandwiched between the Al(2)O(3) layers are deposited by a unique tilted target sputter deposition technique which produces metal nanoparticles as small as 0.5 nm with narrow size distributions at room temperature. The charging behavior of these nanoparticles shows clear single electron tunneling peaks due to the Coulomb blockade effect. Moreover, the average single electron addition energy and height of the single electron tunneling current strongly depend on the size of the Pt nanoparticle. These controllable single electron tunneling behaviors suggest a new route for fabrication of single electron devices.