Ordered arrays of silicon pillars with controlled height and aspect ratio

We report the fabrication of ordered arrays of silicon pillars via a combination of nanosphere lithography (NSL) and reactive ion etching (RIE). For NSL we used monolayers of silica particles self-assembled onto silicon substrates as masks for the deposition of hexagonal arrays of chromium nanoislands. By changing the amount of the deposited metal we fabricated arrays of nanoislands with different size and spacing. By using these arrays as masks for RIE, silicon pillars with different height (up to 1100 nm) and aspect ratio (up to 12:1) could be obtained.