Raman spectroscopy study of group IV semiconductor nanowires

Group IV nanostructures have attracted a great deal of attention because of their potential applications in optoelectronics and nanodevices. Raman spectroscopy has been extensively used to characterize nanostructures since it provides non destructive information about their size, by the adequate modeling of the phonon confinement effect. However, the Raman spectrum is also sensitive to other factors, as stress and temperature, which can mix with the size effects borrowing the interpretation of the Raman spectrum. We present herein an analysis of the Raman spectra obtained for SiGe nanowires; the influence of the excitation conditions and the heat dissipation media are discussed in order to optimize the experimental conditions for reliable spectra acquisition and interpretation. The interpretation of the data is supported by the calculation of the temperature inside the NWs with different diameters.