Low-temperature fabrication of ion-induced Ge nanostructures: Effect of simultaneous Al supply

Ge surfaces were irradiated by Ar⁺ ions at 600 eV with and without simultaneous supply of Ge or Al at room temperature. The surfaces ion-irradiated without any simultaneous metal supply were characterized by densely distributed conical protrusions. By contrast, various kinds of nanostructures were formed on the Ge surfaces ion-irradiated with a simultaneous metal supply. They featured cones and nanobelts with a flattened top for Ge supply cases, whereas they were characterized by the nanorods, nanobelts and nanowalls for Al supply cases. Very interestingly, most of the nanorods and nanobelts formed with an Al supply possessed a bottleneck structure. Thus, the Ge nanostructures were controllable in morphology by species and amount of simultaneously supplied metals.