Edited by the leaders in the fi eld, with chapters from highly renowned international researchers, this is the fi rst coherent overview of the latest in silicon nanomembrane research. As such, it focuses on the fundamental and applied aspects of silicon nanomembranes, ranging from synthesis and manipulation to manufacturing, device integration and system level applications, including uses in bio-integrated electronics, three-dimensional integrated photonics, solar cells, and transient electronics. The first part describes in detail the fundamental physics and materials science involved, as well as synthetic approaches and assembly and manufacturing strategies, while the second covers the wide range of device applications and system level demonstrators already achieved, with examples taken from electronics and photonics and from biomedicine and energy.

Edited by the leaders in the fi eld, with chapters from highly renowned international researchers, this is the fi rst coherent overview of the latest in silicon nanomembrane research. As such, it focuses on the fundamental and applied aspects of silicon nanomembranes, ranging from synthesis and manipulation to manufacturing, device integration and system level applications, including uses in bio-integrated electronics, three-dimensional integrated photonics, solar cells, and transient electronics. The first part describes in detail the fundamental physics and materials science involved, as well as synthetic approaches and assembly and manufacturing strategies, while the second covers the wide range of device applications and system level demonstrators already achieved, with examples taken from electronics and photonics and from biomedicine and energy.

Inorganic material based electronics and photonics on unconventional substrates have shown tremendous unprecedented applications, especially in areas that traditional wafer based electronics and photonics are unable to cover. These areas range from flexible and conformal consumer products to biocompatible medical devices. This thesis presents the research on single crystal silicon nanomembrane photonics on different substrates, especially flexible substrates. A transfer method has been developed to transfer silicon nanomembrane defect-freely onto glass and flexible polyimide substrates. Using this method, intricate single crystal silicon nanomembrane device, such as photonic crystal microcavity, has been transferred onto flexible substrates. To test the device, subwavelength grating couplers are designed and implemented to couple light in and out of the transferred waveguides with high coupling efficiency. The cavity shows a quality factor ~ 9000 with water cladding and ~30000 with glycerol cladding, which is comparable to the same cavity demonstrated on silicon-on-insulator platform, indicating the high quality of the transferred silicon nanomembrane. The device could be bended to a radius less than 15 mm. The experiments show that the resonant wavelength shifts to longer wavelength under tensile stress, while it shifts to shorter wavelength under compressive stress. The sensitivity of the cavity is ~70 nm/RIU, which is independent of bending radius. This demonstration opens vast possibilities for a whole new range of high performance, light-weight and conformal silicon photonic devices. The techniques and devices (e.g. wafer bonding, stamp printing, subwavelength grating couplers, and modulator) generated in the research can also be beneficial for other research fields.

Silicon has been proven to be remarkably resilient as a commercial electronic material. The microelectronics industry has harnessed nanotechnology to continually push the performance limits of silicon devices and integrated circuits. Rather than shrinking its market share, silicon is displacing “competitor” semiconductors in domains such as high-frequency electronics and integrated photonics. There are strong business drivers underlying these trends; however, an important contribution is also being made by research groups worldwide, who are developing new configurations, designs, and applications of silicon-based nanoscale and nanostructured materials. This Special Issue features a selection of papers which illustrate recent advances in the preparation of chemically or physically engineered silicon-based nanostructures and their application in electronic, photonic, and mechanical systems.

Nanoscale materials are showing great promise in various optoelectronics applications, especially the fast-developing fields of optical communication and optical computers. With silicon as the leading material for microelectronics, the integration of optical functions into silicon technology is a very important challenge. This book concentrates on

Photonics is a key technology of this century. The combination of photonics and silicon technology is of great importance because of the potentiality of coupling electronics and optical functions on a single chip. Many experimental and theoretical studies have been performed to understand and design the photonic properties of silicon nanocrystals. Generation of light in silicon is a challenging perspective in the field; however, the issue of light-emitting devices does not limit the activity in the field. Research is also focused on light modulators, optical waveguides and interconnectors, optical amplifiers, detectors, memory elements, photonic crystals, etc. A particularly important task of silicon nanostructures is to generate electrical energy from solar light. Understanding the optical properties of silicon-based materials is central in designing photonic components. It is not possible to control the optical properties of nanoparticles without fundamental information on their microscopic structure, which explains a large number of theoretical works on this subject. Many fundamental and practical problems should be solved in order to develop this technology. In addition to open fundamental questions, it is even more difficult to develop the known experimental results towards practical realization. However, the world market for silicon photonics is expected to be huge; thus, more research activity in the field of silicon nanophotonics is expected in the future. This book describes different aspects of silicon nanophotonics, from fundamental issues to practical devices. The second edition is essentially different from the book published in 2008. Eight chapters of the first edition are not included in the new book, because the recent progress on those topics has not been large enough. Instead, seven new chapters appear. The other eight chapters are essentially modified to describe recent achievements in the field.