III-V Nanowires grown on Silicon for Optoelectronic Device Integration

Linus C. Chuang, Michael Moewe, Shanna Crankshaw

Self-assembled nanowires, which have attracted a lot of attention recently, have unique shapes and properties. The smaller strain energy in a nanowire system is able to ease the lattice matching requirement, which is the main constraint in thin film growth that impedes heterogeneous material integration. By combining the LP-MOCVD growth technique with the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) nanowire growth mechanism, here we show the capability of growing different kinds of III-V nanowires on either traditional III-V substrates or Si substrates. Our InP-nanowire on Si-substrate sample shows room temperature photoluminescence emission with narrow linewidth which indicates high crystal quality. TEM analysis also suggests that this InP nanowire is defect free, regardless of the lattice mismatch between InP and Si, which is as large as 8%. The low-growth-temperature nature of compound semiconductor nanowires also provides the possibility of integrating those direct bandgap materials with as-fabricated Si-based circuits. Therefore, high speed optical inter-connection between or within Si chips could be achieved. Other targeted applications are high efficiency solar cells and gas sensors.

References:

Linus C. Chuang, Shanna Crankshaw, Michael Moewe, Chris Chase, Nobuhiko P. Kobayashi, and Connie Chang-Hasnain. "Critical diameter for III-V nanowires grown on lattice-mismatched substrates," Appl. Phys. Lett. 90, 043115 (2007)