Germanium catalyzed amorphous silicon dioxide nanowire synthesized via thermal evaporation method

One-dimensional (1D) nanostructures have been attracting great interest because they have opportunities for potential applications in nano-electronics and optoelectronics. SiO
2
has attracted great attention due its potential application such as laser emitter, panel displays and sensors [1]. Various SiO
2
nanowires have been produced by several methods, mostly vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) mechanism using different metal catalyst including thermal evaporation [2–4], chemical vapor deposition [5] and laser ablation [6]. Recently, Liu et al. [7] have studied the magnesium catalyzed growth of SiO
2
hierarchical nanostructures by a thermal evaporation process.