Room temperature operation of a single electron transistor made by the scanning tunneling microscope nanooxidation process for the TiOx/Ti system

Abstract

The single electron transistor (SET) is fabricated using the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) as a fabrication process, and the fabricated SET operates at room temperature. Using the STM tip as a cathode, the surface of the titanium metal can be oxidized, and the few tens of nanometer wide oxidized titanium line can be made. The small island region of the SET of ∼30×∼35 nm2 is formed by the oxidized titanium line. The Coulomb staircase of 150 mV period is observed in the current–voltage characteristics of the SET at room temperature.

Niobium and niobium nitride SQUIDs based on anodized nanobridges made with an atomic force microscope

“…Quantum point contacts on a 2D electron gas [8] or in metal [10], nanowires [9], single electron devices [11,17], superconducting devices [13] as well as other nanoscale devices involving nanotubes [14] or clusters [15] have been obtained with this technique.…”

“…As an example, one can cite the tip indentation patterning that takes advantage of the local tip-surface mechanical interaction leading to a surface scratching [4][5][6]). Another technology is given by the local electrochemical oxidation of the surface using a voltage biased tip [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]. In this paper, we will focus on this latter technique although SQUIDs have been successfully obtained using the former one [6].…”

“…Indeed, local anodization of the surface of a semiconductor [8,9] or of non-noble metals [10][11][12] by the biased tip of an AFM is now a popular method for fabrication of nanoscale quantum devices. Quantum point contacts on a 2D electron gas [8] or in metal [10], nanowires [9], single electron devices [11,17], superconducting devices [13] as well as other nanoscale devices involving nanotubes [14] or clusters [15] have been obtained with this technique.…”

Low-frequency noise in single electron tunneling transistor

“…Recently junctions with capacitance as low as CϷ0.1 aF, showing Coulomb blockade and Coulomb staircase at room temperature, have been fabricated by nano-oxidation of a Ti film using the tip of a scanning tunneling microscope ͑STM͒. 10 The major obstacle to future applications of the SET transistor is fluctuations in the excess charge on the island leading to a high level of 1/f ␣ type noise which at low frequencies dominates other intrinsic noise sources such as shot noise and resistance fluctuations. Current or voltage noise with 1/f ␣ ͑␣ between 0.5-1.5͒ frequency dependent noise has been observed in almost all electronic devices, each having a characteristic frequency range and spectral density.…”

A possible nanometer-scale computing device based on an adding cellular automaton

“…One might exploit recent experimental work [9] in which fluctuations of ±1 in the number of electrons on a quantum dot were measured using the pico-amp current flowing through a nearby constriction. Alternatively one might employ single-electron transistors; these devices have recently been made to work at room temperature [10]. We expect it will prove possible to use one such technique to read all the states in the ACA at once (by having one current probe for each ACA cell, as shown in Fig.…”