Haiyan Ou

Formation and characterization of varied size germanium nanocrystals by electron microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and photoluminescence

Germanium nanocrystals are being extensively examined. Their unique optical properties (brought about by the quantum confinement effect) could potentially be applied in wide areas of nonlinear optics, light emission and solid state memory etc. In this paper, Ge nanocrystals embedded in a SiO2 matrix were formed by complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor compatible technology, e.g. plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition and annealing. Different sizes of the Ge nanocrystals were prepared and analyzed by transmission electron microscopy with respect to their size, distribution and crystallization. The samples of different size Ge nanocrystals embedded in the SiO2 matrix were characterized by Raman spectroscopy and photoluminescence. Interplayed size and strain effect of Ge nanocystals was demonstrated by Raman spectroscopy after excluding the thermal effect with proper excitation laser power. It was clarified that two strong emission peaks at 3.19 eV and 4.40 eV are from the interface between Ge nanocrystals and SiO2 matrix.

Effective optimization of surface passivation on porous silicon carbide using atomic layer deposited Al2O3

Porous silicon carbide (B–N co-doped SiC) produced by anodic oxidation showed strong photoluminescence (PL) at around 520 nm excited by a 375 nm laser. The porous SiC samples were passivated by atomic layer deposited (ALD) aluminum oxide (Al2O3) films, resulting in a significant enhancement of the PL intensity (up to 689%). The effect of thickness, annealing temperature, annealing duration and precursor purge time on the PL intensity of ALD Al2O3 films was investigated. In order to investigate the penetration depth and passivation effect in porous SiC, the samples were characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and time-resolved PL. The optimized passivation conditions (20 nm Al2O3 deposited at 160 °C with purge time of 20 s, followed by an annealing for 5 min at 350 °C) for porous SiC were achieved and the results indicate that surface passivation by ALD Al2O3 thin films is a very effective method to enhance the luminescence efficiency of porous SiC.

Fabrication and surface passivation of porous 6H-SiC by atomic layer deposited films

Porous 6H-SiC samples with different thicknesses were fabricated through anodic etching in diluted hydrofluoric acid. Scanning electron microscope images show that the dendritic pore formation in 6H-SiC is anisotropic, which has different lateral and vertical formation rates. Strong photoluminescence was observed and the etching process was optimized in terms of etching time and thickness. Enormous enhancement as well as redshift and broadening of photoluminescence spectra were observed after the passivation by atomic layer deposited Al2O3 and TiO2 films. No obvious luminescence was observed above the 6H-SiC crystal band gap, which suggests that the strong photoluminescence is ascribed to surface state produced during the anodic etching.

Efficiency enhancement of InGaN amber MQWs using nanopillar structures

Abstract We have investigated the use of nanopillar structures on high indium content InGaN amber multiple quantum well (MQW) samples to enhance the emission efficiency. A significant emission enhancement was observed which can be attributed to the enhancement of internal quantum efficiency and light extraction efficiency. The size-dependent strain relaxation effect was characterized by photoluminescence, Raman spectroscopy and time-resolved photoluminescence measurements. In addition, the light extraction efficiency of different MQW samples was studied by finite-different time-domain simulations. Compared to the as-grown sample, the nanopillar amber MQW sample with a diameter of 300 nm has demonstrated an emission enhancement by a factor of 23.8.

Time-Efficient High-Resolution Large-Area Nano-Patterning of Silicon Dioxide

A nano-patterning approach on silicon dioxide (SiO2) material, which could be used for the selective growth of III-V nanowires in photovoltaic applications, is demonstrated. In this process, a silicon (Si) stamp with nanopillar structures was first fabricated using electron-beam lithography (EBL) followed by a dry etching process. Afterwards, the Si stamp was employed in nanoimprint lithography (NIL) assisted with a dry etching process to produce nanoholes on the SiO2 layer. The demonstrated approach has advantages such as a high resolution in nanoscale by EBL and good reproducibility by NIL. In addition, high time efficiency can be realized by one-spot electron-beam exposure in the EBL process combined with NIL for mass production. Furthermore, the one-spot exposure enables the scalability of the nanostructures for different application requirements by tuning only the exposure dose. The size variation of the nanostructures resulting from exposure parameters in EBL, the pattern transfer during nanoimprint in NIL, and subsequent etching processes of SiO2 were also studied quantitatively. By this method, a hexagonal arranged hole array in SiO2 with a hole diameter ranging from 45 to 75 nm and a pitch of 600 nm was demonstrated on a four-inch wafer.

Geometrical Control of 3C and 6H-SiC Nucleation on Low Off-Axis Substrates

Growth of 3C or 6H-SiC epilayers on low off-axis 6H-SiC substrates can be mastered by changing the size of the on axis plane formed by long terraces in the epilayer using geometrical control. The desired polytype can be selected in thick (~200 µm) layers of both 6H-SiC and 3C-SiC polytypes on substrates with off-orientation as low as 1.4 and 2 degrees. The resultant crystal quality of the 3C and the 6H-SiC epilayers, grown under the same process parameters, deteriorates when lowering the off-orientation of the substrate.

InGaN/GaN ultraviolet LED with a graphene/AZO transparent current spreading layer

We report an approach of using an interlayer of single layer graphene (SLG) for electroluminescence (EL) enhancement of an InGaN/GaN-based near-ultraviolet (NUV) light-emitting diode (LED) with an aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO)-based current spreading layer (CSL). AZO-based CSLs with and without a SLG interlayer were fabricated on the NUV LED epi-wafers. The current-voltage (I-V) characteristic and the EL intensity were measured and compared. We find that the LED without the SLG interlayer can possess a 40% larger series resistance. Furthermore, a 95% EL enhancement was achieved by the employment of the SLG interlayer.

Influence of negative-U centers related carrier dynamics on donor-acceptor-pair emission in fluorescent SiC

E1/E2 defects are the typical negative-U centers in n-type 6H silicon carbide (SiC). They are the main contributors to non-radiative recombination, which limits the carrier lifetime. In this study, two fluorescent 6H silicon carbide (f-SiC) samples and one bulk substrate were characterized via time-resolved photoluminescence (TRPL) and static photoluminescence (PL) measurements, where all the samples were nitrogen-boron co-doped 6H n-type. The existence of E1/E2 defects, which caused the diminution of the internal quantum efficiency (IQE) and luminescence intensity of each sample, was confirmed by applying a carrier dynamics model based on negative-U centers. The carrier dynamics simulation reveals that the density of the E1/E2 defects in bulk 6H SiC is two orders of magnitude higher than that of the f-SiC sample, causing much lower PL intensity in the bulk substrate compared to the two f-SiC samples. The IQE of the two f-SiC samples was extracted from the corresponding TRPL results, where the contrast between their IQE was further confirmed by the related PL measurement results. The slight difference in IQE between the two f-SiC samples was attributed to slightly different E1/E2 defect concentrations. On the other hand, by implementing a steady-state donor-acceptor-pair (DAP) recombination calculation, it was found that the f-SiC sample with lower IQE had a higher DAP transition probability due to the higher doping level. This prompted further optimizations in the f-SiC crystal growth conditions in order to decrease the E1/E2 defects while maintaining the correct doping parameters.E1/E2 defects are the typical negative-U centers in n-type 6H silicon carbide (SiC). They are the main contributors to non-radiative recombination, which limits the carrier lifetime. In this study, two fluorescent 6H silicon carbide (f-SiC) samples and one bulk substrate were characterized via time-resolved photoluminescence (TRPL) and static photoluminescence (PL) measurements, where all the samples were nitrogen-boron co-doped 6H n-type. The existence of E1/E2 defects, which caused the diminution of the internal quantum efficiency (IQE) and luminescence intensity of each sample, was confirmed by applying a carrier dynamics model based on negative-U centers. The carrier dynamics simulation reveals that the density of the E1/E2 defects in bulk 6H SiC is two orders of magnitude higher than that of the f-SiC sample, causing much lower PL intensity in the bulk substrate compared to the two f-SiC samples. The IQE of the two f-SiC samples was extracted from the corresponding TRPL results, where the contrast be...

Experimentally Validated Dispersion Tailoring in a Silicon Strip Waveguide With Alumina Thin-Film Coating

We propose a silicon strip waveguide structure with alumina thin-film coating in-between the core and the cladding for group-velocity dispersion tailoring. By carefully designing the core dimension and the coating thickness, a spectrally-flattened near-zero anomalous group-velocity dispersion within the telecom spectral range is obtained, which is predicted to significantly broaden the bandwidth of four-wave mixing. We validate this by characterizing the wavelength conversion in a waveguide sample by atomic layer deposition technology, which to our best knowledge is the first experimental demonstration of the proposed structure. Due to the alumina thin-film coating, the wavelength conversion bandwidth reaches

Dispersion tailoring of a silicon strip waveguide employing Titania-Alumina thin-film coating

58,mathrm{nm}