Optical investigation of InAs/InP(1 0 0) quantum dots grown by gas source molecular beam epitaxy

We report on the optical characteristics of InAs quantum dots based on the InP(1 0 0) substrate grown by gas source molecular beam epitaxy without assisting any other methods. The photoluminescence was carefully investigated by adjusting the thickness of InAs layers and the growth temperature. A wide range of emitting peaks is obtained with the increase in the thickness of InAs layers. In addition, we find that the morphology and shape of quantum dots also greatly depend on InAs layers. The images of atomic force microscopy show that the quantum dots like forming into quantum dashes elongated along the [0 1 ?1] direction when the thickness of InAs layers increased. A critical thickness of formation quantum dots or quantum dash is obtained. At the same time, we observe that the growth temperature also has a great impact on the emission wavelength peaks. High qualities of InAs/InP(1 0 0) quantum dots providing their emission wavelength in 1.55 μm are obtained, and good performances of quantum dots lasers are fabricated.     

Growth conditions effects on optical properties of InAs quantum dots grown by molecular beam epitaxy on GaAs (1 1 3)A substrate

We have investigated the optical properties of InAs/GaAs (1 1 3)A quantum dots grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) with different growth rates by photoluminescence spectroscopy (PL) as a function of the excitation density and the sample temperature (10–300 K). Reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED) is used to investigate the formation process of InAs quantum dots (QDs). A redshift of the InAs QDs PL band emission was observed when the growth rate was increased. This result was explained by the increase of the InAs quantum dot size with increasing growth rate. A significant redshift was observed when the arsenic flux was decreased. The evolution of the PL peak energy with increasing temperature has showed an S-shaped form due to the localization effects and is attributed to the efficient relaxation process of carriers in different InAs quantum dots and to the exciton transfer localized at the wetting layer.     

Growth of InGaAs-capped InAs quantum dots characterized by Atomic Force Microscope and Scanning Electron Microscope

Atomic force microscopy (AFM) is typically used to measure the quantum dot shape and density formed by lattice mismatched epitaxial growth such as InAs on GaAs. However, AFM images are distorted when two dots are situated in juxtaposition with a distance less than the AFM tip width. Scanning electron Microscope (SEM) is much better in distinguishing the dot density but not the dot height. Through these measurements of the growth of In_xGa_1-xAs cap layer on InAs quantum dots, it was observed that the InGaAs layer neither covered the InAs quantum dots and wetting layer uniformly nor 100% phase separates into InAs and GaAs grown on InAs quantum dots and wetting layer, respectively.     

Long-wavelength light emission from InAs quantum dots covered by GaAsSb grown on GaAs substrates

We fabricated InAs quantum dots (QDs) with a GaAsSb strain-reducing layer (SRL) on a GaAs(0 0 1) substrate. The wavelength of emission from InAs QD is shown to be controllable by changing the composition and thickness of the SRL. An increase in photoluminescence intensity with increasing compositions of Sb and thickness of the GaAsSb SRL is also seen. The efficiency of radiative recombination was improved under both conditions because the InAs/GaAsSb/GaAs hetero-interface band structure more effectively suppressed carrier escape from the InAs QDs.     

Controlling emission wavelength from InAs self-assembled quantum dots on InP (0 0 1) during MOCVD

We studied the growth of InAs quantum dots on InP (0 0 1) substrates in a low-pressure metalorganic chemical vapor deposition by using a so-called InP ‘double-cap’ procedure. With double-capping, a photoluminescence spectrum is modified into a series of multiple peaks, where the emission peaks arise from several quantum dot families with different heights changing in a step of integer number of an InAs monolayer. Cross-sectional transmission electron micrograph observations revealed that the shape of double-capped dots is dramatically changed into a thin plate-like shape with extremely flat upper and lower interfaces, being consistent with our interpretation of the photoluminescence spectrum. We showed that the procedure was extremely useful for controlling the emission wavelength from quantum dots in an InAs/InP (0 0 1) system.     

Microwave-assisted synthesis of Cu2ZnSnS4 nanocrystals as a novel anode material for lithium ion battery

One-dimensional ordered quantum-ring chains are fabricated on a quantum-dot superlattice template by molecular beam epitaxy. The quantum-dot superlattice template is prepared by stacking multiple quantum-dot layers and quantum-ring chains are formed by partially capping quantum dots. Partially capping InAs quantum dots with a thin layer of GaAs introduces a morphological change from quantum dots to quantum rings. The lateral ordering is introduced by engineering the strain field of a multi-layer InGaAs quantum-dot superlattice.     

Coulomb oscillations of the current through spin-nondegenerate <Emphasis Type="Italic">p</Emphasis> states of InAs quantum dots

The electron transport is studied in split-gate structures fabricated on the basis of a modulation-doped heterostructure that contains a single quantum well and self-assembled InAs quantum dots near the 2D electron gas regions. The current passing through the channel with a denumerable set of InAs quantum dots is found to exhibit Coulomb oscillations as a function of the gate voltage. The oscillations are associated with the excited p states of InAs quantum dots, which are characterized by opposite spins and caused by lifting of the spin degeneracy of the p state due to the Coulomb interaction. The Coulomb oscillations of the current are observed up to a temperature of ～20 K. The Coulomb energy is found to be ΔE_c = 12.5 meV, which agrees well with the theoretical estimates for the p states of quantum dots in the structures under study.     

The influence of local phonon modes in a wide-band matrix on the tunnel current-voltage characteristics of quasi-zero-dimensional structures

Experimental results on the visualization of the density of states in InAs/GaSa(001) quantum dots that were obtained by tunnel atomic-force microscopy in an ultrahigh vacuum are presented. A one-dimensional (1D) model of dissipative quantum tunneling is proposed for describing experimental current-voltage characteristics of a tunnel contact between an atomic force microscope probe and the surface of InAs/GaAs (001) quantum dots. It was found that the influence of two local modes of the wide-band matrix on the probability of 1D dissipative tunneling leads to the appearance of several randomly spaced peaks in the field dependence. It was shown that the theoretical dependence agrees qualitatively with experimental the current-voltage characteristic of the atomic force microscope tip and the surface of InAs/GaAs(001) quantum dots.     

内嵌InAs量子点的δ掺杂GaAs/AlxGa1-xAs二维电子气特性分析

采用分子束外延技术对δ掺杂GaAs/Al_xGa_1-xAs二维电子气(2DEG)样品进行了生长. 在样品生长过程中, 分别改变掺杂浓度(N_d)、空间隔离层厚度(W_d) 和Al_xGa_1-xAs中Al组分(x_Al)的大小, 并在双温(300 K, 78 K)条件下对生长的样品进行了霍尔测量; 结合测试结果, 分别对N_d, W_d及x_Al与GaAs/Al_xGa_1-xAs 2DEG的载流子浓度和迁移率之间的关系规律进行了细致的分析讨论. 生长了包含有低密度InAs量子点层的δ掺杂GaAs/Al_xGa_1-xAs 2DEG 样品, 采用梯度生长法得到了不同密度的InAs量子点. 霍尔测量结果表明, 随着InAs量子点密度的增加, GaAs/Al_xGa_1-xAs 2DEG的迁移率大幅度减小, 实验中获得了密度最低为16×10⁸/cm²的InAs量子点样品. 实验结果为内嵌InAs量子点的δ掺杂GaAs/Al_xGa_1-xAs 2DEG的研究和应用提供了依据和参考. 关键词： 二维电子气 InAs量子点 载流子浓度 迁移率     

Grid-pattern aligned InAs self-assembled quantum dots grown on InP substrate

We present a method to control the nucleation sites of InAs self-assembled quantum dots (QDs). Tensile-strained material, such as GaAs used here, was grown on InP substrates before InAs deposition. This thin GaAs layer can provide a surface with grid-pattern trenches which have the same function as atomic-steps and are promising for the formation of QDs with controlled nucleation sites. Atom force microscopy (AFM) measurement was performed and the AFM images indicate that the InAs islands grown with our technique are grid-pattern aligned and have good homogeneity and low size fluctuation. In addition, another kind of three-dimensional structure with larger size would coexist with normal QDs if a 30nm thick GaAs layer was deposited. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Effects of thermal annealing on the interband transitions of single and vertically stacked InAs/GaAs self-assembled quantum dots

Photoluminescence (PL) measurements have been carried out to investigate the annealing effects in one-period and three-periods of InAs/GaAs self-assembled quantum dots (QDs) grown on GaAs substrates by using molecular beam epitaxy. After annealing, the PL spectra for the annealed InAs/GaAs QDs showed dramatic blue shifts and significant linewidth narrowing of the PL peaks compared with the as-grown samples. The variations in the PL peak position and the full width at half-maximum of the PL peak are attributed to changes in the composition of the InAs QDs resulting from the interdiffusion between the InAs QDs and the GaAs barrier and to the size homogeneity of the QDs. These results indicate that the optical properties and the crystal qualities of InAs/GaAs QDs are dramatically changed by thermal treatment.     

Effects of growth conditions on the formation of self-assembled InAs quantum dots grown on (1 1 5)A GaAs substrate

Effects of growth conditions on the formation of InAs quantum dots (QDs) grown on GaAs (1 1 5)A substrate were investigated by using the reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED) and photoluminescence spectroscopy (PL). An anomalous evolution of wetting layer was observed when increasing the As/In flux ratio. This is attributed to a change in the surface reconstruction. PL measurements show that QDs emission was strongly affected by the InAs deposited amount. No obvious signature of PL emission QDs appears for sample with 2.2 ML InAs coverage. Furthermore, carrier tunneling from the dots to the non-radiative centers via the inclination continuum band is found to be the dominant mechanism for the InAs amount deposition up to 4.2 MLs.     

Strong photoluminescence and laser operation of InAs quantum dots covered by a GaAsSb strain-reducing layer

GaAsSb strain-reducing layers (SRLs) are applied to cover InAs quantum dots (QDs) grown on GaAs substrates. The compressive strain induced in InAs QDs is reduced due to the tensile strain induced by the GaAsSb SRL, resulting in a redshift of photoluminescence (PL) peaks of the InAs QDs. A strong PL signal around a wavelength of 1.3 μm was observed even at room temperature. A laser diode containing InAs QDs with GaAsSb SRLs in the active region was fabricated, which exhibits laser oscillation in pulsed operation at room temperature. These results indicate that GaAsSb SRLs have a high potential for fabricating high efficient InAs QDs laser diodes operating at long-wavelength regimes.     

InAs/GaAs quantum dot infrared photodetectors with different growth temperatures

InAs/GaAs quantum dot infrared photodetectors were fabricated with quantum dots grown at three different temperatures. Large detection wavelength shift (5–14.5 μm) was demonstrated by changing 40 degrees of the epitaxy temperature. The smaller quantum dots grown at lower temperature generate 14.5 μm responses. The detectivity of the normal incident 15 μm QDIP at 77 K is 3 × 10⁸ cm Hz^1/2/W. A three-color detector was also demonstrated with quantum dots grown at medium temperature. The three-color detection comes from two groups of different sizes of dots within one QD layer. This new type of multicolor detector shows unique temperature tuning behavior that was never reported before.     

Comparison of single-layer and bilayer InAs/GaAs quantum dots with a higher InAs coverage

Epitaxially grown self-assembled InAs quantum dots (QDs) have found applications in optoelectronics. Efforts are being made to obtain efficient quantum-dot lasers operating at longer telecommunication wavelengths, specifically 1.3 μm and 1.55 μm. This requires narrow emission linewidth from the quantum dots at these wavelengths. In InAs/GaAs single layer quantum dot (SQD) structure, higher InAs monolayer coverage for the QDs gives rise to larger dots emitting at longer wavelengths but results in inhomogeneous dot-size distribution. The bilayer quantum dot (BQD) can be used as an alternative to SQDs, which can emit at longer wavelengths (1.229 μm at 8 K) with significantly narrow linewidth (∼16.7 meV). Here, we compare the properties of single layer and bilayer quantum dots grown with higher InAs monolayer coverage. In the BQD structure, only the top QD layer is covered with increased (3.2 ML) InAs monolayer coverage. The emission line width of our BQD sample is found to be insensitive towards post growth treatments.     

MBE自组织生长多层竖直自对准InAs量子点结构的研究

利用MBE方法在(001)GaAs衬底上生长了多层竖直自对准InAs量子点结构。透射电子显微镜的观察表明,多层量子点成一系列柱状分布。同单层量子点相比,多层量子点的光荧光谱线发生红移。这表明由于量子点中载流子波函数的扩展和交迭,柱中量子点之间有耦合现象发生。光荧光谱线半高宽随温度的反常变化说明载流子还会在邻近柱中隧穿.     

Fabrication of a complex InAs ring-and-dot structure by droplet epitaxy

An InAs ring structure accompanying the formation of quantum dots (QDs) was fabricated on (1 0 0)GaAs using droplet epitaxy. The QDs were located in the vicinity of the ring, due to the diffusion of In atoms from the In droplets. In addition, the dots were found to have distributed elliptically and preferentially along the [0 1 1] direction, implying that In itself prefers to diffuse along the [0 1 1] direction, which is the opposite of the favorable diffusion orientation of group III atoms on (1 0 0)GaAs under a commonly used As-stabilized growth condition. This is the first observation of a ring structure accompanying the formation of quantum dots in droplet epitaxy.     

带有InGaAs覆盖层的InAs量子点红外探测器材料的发光与光电响应

利用分子束外延技术(MBE),在GaAs(001)衬底上自组织生长了不同结构的InAs量子点样品,并制备了量子点红外探测器件。利用原子力显微镜(AFM)和光致发光(PL)光谱研究了量子点的表面结构、形貌和光学性质。渐变InGaAs层的插入有效地释放了InAs量子点所受的应力,抑制了量子点中In组分的偏析,提高了外延层的生长质量,降低了势垒高度,使InAs量子点荧光波长红移。伏安特性曲线和光电流(PC)谱结果表明,生长条件的优化提高了器件的红外响应,具有组分渐变的InGaAs层的探测器响应波长发生明显红移。     

Continuous wavelength tuning of InAs quantum dots on InP (1 0 0) and (3 1 1)A substrates by chemical-beam epitaxy

The growth of InAs quantum dots (QDs) on InP (1 0 0) and (3 1 1)A substrates by chemical-beam epitaxy is studied. The InAs QDs are embedded in a GaInAsP layer lattice-matched to InP. We demonstrate an effective way to continuously tune the emission wavelength of InAs QDs grown on InP (1 0 0). With an ultra-thin GaAs layer inserted between the QD layer and the GaInAsP buffer, the peak wavelength from the InAs QDs can be continuously tuned from above 1.6 μm down to 1.5 μm at room temperature. The major role of the thin GaAs layer is to greatly suppress the As/P exchange during the deposition of InAs and subsequent growth interruption under arsenic flux, as well as to consume the segregated In layer floating on the GaInAsP buffer. Moreover, it is found that InP (3 1 1)A substrates are particularly promising for formation of uniform InAs QDs. The growth of InAs on InP (3 1 1)A consists of two stages: nanowire formation due to strain-driven growth instability and subsequent QD formation on top of the wires. The excellent size uniformity of the InAs QDs obtained on InP (3 1 1)A manifests itself in the narrow photoluminescence line width of 26 meV at 4.8 K.     

Studying the mechanism of ordered growth of InAs quantum dots on GaAs/InP

We study the mechanism of ordered growth of InAs quantum dots (islands) on a GaAs/InP substrate in theory and point out that the tensile strain can be used to control InAs/InP self-assembled quantum dots arrangement. Photoluminescence spectrum, and atomic force microscopy images have been investigated. In the experiment, ordered InAs islands have been obtained and the maximum density of quantum dots is 1.6×10¹⁰ cm⁻² at 4 monolayers InAs layer.