abstract: Optoelectronic and microelectronic applications of germanium-based materials have received considerable research interest in recent years. A novel method for Ge on Si heteroepitaxy required for such applications was developed via molecular epitaxy of Ge5H12. Next, As(GeH3)3, As(SiH3)3, SbD3, S(GeH3)2 and S(SiH3)2 molecular sources were utilized in degenerate n-type doping of Ge. The epitaxial Ge films produced in this work incorporate donor atoms at concentrations above the thermodynamic equilibrium limits. The donors are nearly fully activated, and led to films with lowest resistivity values thus far reported. Band engineering of Ge was achieved by alloying with Sn. Epitaxy of the alloy layers was conducted on virtual Ge substrates, and made use of the germanium hydrides Ge2H6 and Ge3H8, and the Sn source SnD4. These films exhibit stronger emission than equivalent material deposited directly on Si, and the contributions from the direct and indirect edges can be separated. The indirect-direct crossover composition for Ge1-ySny alloys was determined by photoluminescence (PL). By n-type doping of the Ge1-ySny alloys via P(GeH3)3, P(SiH3)3 and As(SiH3)3, it was possible to enhance photoexcited emission by more than an order-of-magnitude. The above techniques for deposition of direct gap Ge1-ySny alloys and doping of Ge were combined with p-type doping methods for Ge1-ySny using B2H6 to fabricate pin heterostructure diodes with active layer compositions up to y=0.137. These represent the first direct gap light emitting diodes made from group IV materials. The effect of the single defected n-i¬ interface in a n-Ge/i-Ge1-ySny/p-Ge1-zSnz architecture on electroluminescence (EL) was studied. This led to lattice engineering of the n-type contact layer to produce diodes of n-Ge1-xSnx/i-Ge1-ySny/p-Ge1-zSnz architecture which are devoid of interface defects and therefore exhibit more efficient EL than the previous design. Finally, n-Ge1-ySny/p-Ge1-zSnz pn junction devices were synthesized with varying composition and doping parameters to investigate the effect of these properties on EL. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Chemistry 2016

Terahertz time-domain spectroscopy systems were developed and used for the anaylsis and characterization of various materials. By using ultra-fast Ti:Sapphire and Er-doped fiber lasers, terahertz time-domain spectrometers of different configurations were constructed and tested. To increase the accuracy and sensitivity of the measurements, the systems were optimized for spectroscopic analysis. MBE grown nominally undoped epitaxial GaAs samples were used for the spectroscopic measurements. These samples were first charactrized by electrical measurements in order to check the accuracy of the terahertz time-domain experiments. We have shown that the terahertz time-domin spectroscopic techniques provides a quick way of the determining the real ( ) and complex () components of the refractive index of material. In addition, we have investigated the photoexcitation dynamics of these GaAs samples. We have demonstrated that direct and photoexcited terahertz time-domain measurements give an estimate of the carrier densities and both the hole and electron mobility values with good precision. rnin An algorithm is developed to prevent the unwanted Fabry-Perot reflections which is commonly encountered in Terahertz Spectroscopy systems. We have performed terahertz time-domain transmission measurements on ZnTe &lt / 110&gt / crystals of various thicknesses to test the applicability of this algorithm. We have shown that the algorithm developed provides a quick way of eliminating the &ldquo / etalon&rdquo / reflections from the data. In addition, it is also shown that these &ldquo / etalon&rdquo / effects can be used for the frequency calibration of terahertz time-domain spectrometers.