ABSTRACT

This chapter presents the processes for fabrication of well-organized planar arrays of silicon nanostructures. The reduction of the thermal conductivity in silicon nanowires and nanostructures has been demonstrated on devices made of one, or very few, nanostructures. These devices are of paramount importance, because they allow the investigation of the fundamental properties of the electrical and heat transport at nanoscale. The chapter illustrates the main research streams which are focused on the exploitation of silicon nanostructures for the fabrication of devices for high-efficiency thermoelectric conversion. A thermoelectric generator is made of many thermoelectric modules, connected both in series and in parallel. The main issue for the fabrication of thermoelectric generators based on vertical nanowires is to provide the nanowire forests with contacts necessary for both the electrical and the thermal transport. At the bottom, the nanowires are anchored to the silicon substrate, which is a good thermal and electrical conductor.