  Fe-Si binary compounds have been fabricated by focused electron beam induced
deposition by the alternating use of iron pentacarbonyl, Fe(CO)5, and
neopentasilane, Si5H12 as precursor gases. The fabrication procedure consisted
in preparing multilayer structures which were treated by low-energy electron
irradiation and annealing to induce atomic species intermixing. In this way we
are able to fabricate FeSi and Fe3Si binary compounds from [Fe=Si]2 and
[Fe3=Si]2 multilayers, as shown by transmission electron microscopy
investigations. This fabrication procedure is useful to obtain nanostructured
binary alloys from precursors which compete for adsorption sites during growth
and, therefore, cannot be used simultaneously.
