Thermal Transport Properties of Individual Nanowires

Abstract

This thesis aims to study thermal transport in various kinds of nanowires (NWs) to elucidate phonon transport in quasi one-dimensional nanostructures. The thermal transport properties of zinc oxide (ZnO), vanadium dioxide (VO2), and silicon (Si) NWs are reported in this thesis. The effects of a coating of amorphous carbon on the NW and defects induced by gallium ion beam irradiation on the thermal transport were investigated. The correlation between electrical and thermal properties in VO2 NWs is also studied in the vicinity of transition temperature. Furthermore, this thesis sets out to study the impact of modifications to the surface morphology on the thermal conductivity of Si NWs. All the thermal and electrical measurements were carried out using a home-made measurement set-up and micro-electro-thermal system (METS) devices.