<p>This licentiate thesis deals with the electronic and geometrical properties of metal-semiconductor and organic-semiconductor interfaces investigated by photoelectron spectroscopy and scanning tunneling microscopy. </p><p>First in line is the Co-InAs interface (metal-semiconductor) where it is found that Co is reactive and upon adsorption and thermal treatment it alloys with the indium of the substrate to form metallic islands, about 20 nm in diameter. The resulting broken bonds causes As entities to form which are loosely bond to the surface and evaporate upon thermal treatment. Thus, the adsorption of Co results in a rough interface. </p><p>Secondly the metal-free phthalocyanine (H₂PC) - titanium dioxide interface (organic-semiconductor) is investigated. Here it is found that the organic molecules arrange themselves along the substrate rows upon thermal treatment. The interaction with the TiO₂ is mainly with the valence Π-electrons in the molecule causing a relatively strong bond, but this interaction is short range as the second layer of molecules retains their molecular character. This results in an ordered adsorption but limited mobility of the molecules on the surface prohibiting well ordered close packed layers. Furthermore, the hydrogen atoms inside the cyclic molecule leave the central void upon thermal treatment.</p><p>The third case is the H₂PC-InAs/InSb interface (organic-semiconductor). Here ordered overlayer growth is found on both substrates where the molecules are preferentially adsorbed on the In rows in the [110] direction forming one-dimensional chains. The InSb-H₂PC interface is found to be weakly interacting and the bulk-like molecular character is retained upon both adsorption and thermal treatment. On the InAs-H₂PC interface, however, the interaction is stronger. The molecules are more affected by the surface bond and this effect stretches up a few monolayers in the film after annealing.</p>

A densely and monolithically integrated photonic chip on indium phosphide is greatly in need for data transmission but the present day’s level of integration in InP is very low. Silicon enjoys a unique position among all the semiconductors in its level of integration. But it suffers from its slow signal transmission between the circuit boards and between the chips as it uses conventional electronic wire connections. This being the bottle-neck that hinders enhanced transmission speed, optical-interconnects in silicon have been the dream for several years. Suffering from its inherent deficient optical properties, silicon is not supposed to offer this feasibility in the near future. Hence, integration of direct bandgap materials, such as indium phosphide on silicon, is one of the viable alternatives. This thesis addresses these two issues, namely monolithic integration on indium phosphide and monolithic integration of indium phosphide on silicon. To this end, we use two techniques, namely selective epitaxy and heteroepitaxy by employing hydride vapor phase epitaxy method. The first part deals with the exploitation of selective epitaxy for fabricating a discrete and an integrated chip based on InP. The former is a multi-quantum well buried heterostructure laser emitting at 1.55 µm that makes use of AlGaInAs and InGaAsP as the barrier and well, respectively. We demonstrate that even though it contains Al in the active region, semi-insulating InP:Fe can be regrown. The lasers demonstrate threshold as low as 115A/cm2/quantum well, an external quantum efficiency of 45% and a characteristic temperature of 78 K, all at 20 oC. Concerning the integrated device, we demonstrate complex and densely packed buried arrayed waveguide (AWG) structures found in advanced systems-on-the-chip for optical code-division multiple-access (O-CDMA). We present a case of an error-free 10 Gb/s encoding and decoding operation from an eight-channel AWGs with 180 GHz channel spacing. Selective epitaxial growth aspects specific to these complicated structures are also described and guidance on design implementation of these AWGs is given. Mass transport studies on these AWGs are also presented. The second part deals with various studies on and relevant to epitaxial lateral overgrowth (ELOG) of high quality InP on silicon. (i) ELOG often encounters cases where most part of the surface is covered by mask. From the modeling on large mask area effects, their impact on the transport and kinetic properties has been established. (ii) It is known that ELOG causes strain in the materials. From synchrotron X-ray measurements, strain is shown to have large effect on the mask edges and the underlying substrate. (iii) The combination of strain and the influence of image forces when reducing the opening dimensions in ELOG has been modeled. It is found to be very beneficial to reduce openings down to ~100 nm where effective filtering of dislocations is predicted to take place even in vicinity of the openings. We call it nano-ELOG. (iv) By combining the modeling results of nano-ELOG and of a pre-study of ELOG on pure InP, a novel net pattern design is invented and experimented for nano-ELOG of InP on Si. PL measurements together with transmission electron microscopy observations indicate beneficial effects of small size openings (200 nm) compared to 1000 nm openings. (v) ELOG of InP on silicon-on-insulators together with a multi-quantum well structure grown on it has been demonstrated for the first time. This is particularly interesting for integrating silicon/silicon dioxide waveguides with InP. / QC 20100902

It is very interesting to probe the rotational symmetry of semiconductor quantum dots for quantum information and quantum computation applications. We studied the effects of rotational symmetry in semiconductor quantum dots using configuration interaction calculation. Moreover, to compare with the experimental data, we studied the effects of hidden symmetry. The 2D single-band model and the 3D single-band model were used to generate the single-particle states. How the spectra affected by the breaking of hidden symmetry and rotational symmetry are discussed. The breaking of hidden symmetry splits the degeneracy of electron-hole single-triplet and triplet-singlet states, which can be clearly seen from the spectra. The breaking of rotational symmetry redistributes the weight percentage, due to the splitting of px and py states, and gives a small brightness to the dark transition, giving rise to asymmetry peaks. The asymmetry peaks of 4X, 5X, and 6X were analyzed numerically. In addition, Auger-like satellites of biexciton recombination were found in the calculation. There is an asymmetry peak of the biexciton Auger-like satellite for the 2D single-band model while no such asymmetry peak occurs for the 3D single-band model. Few-particle effects are needed in order to determine the energy separation of the biexciton main peak and the Auger-like satellite. From the experiments, it was confirmed that the lower emission energy peak of X2-spectrum is split. The competed splitting of the X2- spectra were revealed when temperature dependence was implemented. However, since the splitting is small, we suggest the X2- peaks are broadened in comparison with other configurations according to single-band models. Furthermore, the calculated excitonic emission patterns were compared with experiments. The 2D single-band model fails to give the correct energy order of the peaks for the few-particle spectra; on the other hand the peaks order from 3D single-band model consistent with experimental data.

The aim of this thesis work was to fabricate a hybrid LED using organic-inorganic ZnO materials. The goal of the project was to get an efficient white light emission from zinc oxide (ZnO) nanorods active layer. Since most of the organic materials are good for hole mobility and most of the inorganic materials are good for electron mobility, it is possible to fabricate a high performance heterostructure electroluminescence device from organic-inorganic materials. This thesis work was an attempt towards fabricating such a high electroluminescence LED from hybrid materials in which polymer acts as a p-type material and ZnO acts as a n-type material. The growth mechanism of ZnO nanorods using low-temperature aqueous solution method has been studied and nanorods (NRs) growth was examined with scanning electron microscope (SEM). Optimum hole injection polymers have been studied. Finally, the fabricated device was characterized using parameter analyzer. The fabricated device worked as a diode i.e. it rectified current as expected and the desirable light emission has almost been achieved.

Vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) are today a commodity on the short wavelength laser market due to the ease with which they are manufactured. Much effort has in the last decade been directed towards making long wavelength VCSELs as successful in the marketplace. This has not been achieved due to the much more difficult fabrication technologies needed for realising high performance long wavelength VCSELs. At one point, GaInNAs quantum wells gain regions grown on GaAs substrates seemed to be the solution as it enabled all-epitaxial VCSELs that could make use of high contrast AlGaAs-based distributed Bragg reflectors (DBRs) as mirrors and lateral selective oxidation for optical and electrical confinement, thereby mimicking the successful design of short wavelength VCSELs. Although very good device results were achieved, reproducible and reliable epitaxial growth of GaInNAs quantum wells proved difficult and the technology has not made its way into high-volume production. Other approaches to the manufacturing and material problems have been to combine mature InP-based gain regions with high contrast AlGaAs-based DBRs by wafer fusion or with high contrast dielectric DBRs. Commonly, a patterned tunnel junction provides the electrical confinement in these VCSELs. Excellent performance has been achieved in this way but the fabrication process is difficult. In this work, we have employed high strain InGaAs quantum wells along with large detuning between the gain peak and the emission wavelength to realize GaAs-based long wavelength VCSELs. All-epitaxial VCSELs with AlGaAs-based DBRs and lateral oxidation confinement were fabricated and evaluated. The efficiency of these VCSELs was limited due to the optical absorption in the doped DBRs. To improve the efficiency and manufacturability, two novel optical and electrical confinement schemes based on epitaxial regrowth of current blocking layers were developed. The first scheme is based on a single regrowth step and requires very precise processing. This scheme was therefore not developed beyond the first generation but single mode power of 0.3 mW at low temperature, -10ºC, was achieved. The second scheme is based on two epitaxial regrowth steps and does not require as precise processing. Several generations of this design were manufactured and resulted in record high power of 8 mW at low temperature, 5ºC, and more than 3 mW at high temperature, 85ºC. Single mode power was more modest with 1.5 mW at low temperature and 0.8 mW at high temperature, comparable to the performance of the single mode lateral oxidation confined VCSELs. The reason for the modest single mode power was found to be a non-optimal cavity shape after the second regrowth that leads to poor lateral overlap between the gain in the quantum wells and the intensity of the optical field. / QC 20100825

This thesis investigates different material systems and processing technology for high temperature compatible laser diodes used in volume applications within the 1.3-μm telecom wavelength window. Laser diodes built from such materials are much desired in order to eleminate the need for active temperature control needed in current systems, which significantly increases both complexity, size and cost. The structures were grown by Metal-Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) and the evaluation of materials was performed using different characterization methods such as High-Resolution X-Ray Diffraction (HR-XRD), Photoluminescence (PL), Time-Resolved Photoluminescence (TR-PL). Fabrication and evaluation of Fabry-Perot lasers with different geometries was used to check the material quality and temperature performance. A novel in-situ etching technique was developed for the use i future more advanced, buried hetrostructure lasers. The first studied materials system was AlGaInAsP/InGaAsP/InP. To handle a 5-element material with the precision required, modelling of the materials and heterostructure properties was performed. The addition of Al to the InGaAsP barrier allows better electron confinement with little change in valence band properties. The optimum aluminium content was found to be about 12%. Although the effect of Al could be identified, it was not sufficient with T0 of only 90 K only up to 60 °C. A second materials system InGaP/InAsP/ InP initially looked quite promising from a materials and quantum well design point of view but encountered severe problems with the device integration and further work was discontinued. The main effort was therefore was devoted to a third materials system: AlGaInAs/AlGaInAs/InP. This material system is not unknown but has hitherto not found a widespread application for fibre optic applications. In this work, the MOCVD growth of 1.3 μ;m quantum well laser structures was optimized and ridge waveguide laser devices with excellent temperature performance was fabricated (T0 = 97 K at 85 °C). A ridge waveguide laser was identified as suitable structure since it requires only a single epitaxial growth, thus avoiding the main problem of oxidation of Al based buried structures. The dynamic performance was excellent up to 110 °C and the device fabrication is highly reliable (lifetime &gt;7000 h). This high yield uncooled ridge Fabry-Perot laser process has now been transferred to production and is applied in short length 10 Gb/s multimode links. In order to further improve the usefulness of the Al-containing materials in even higher performance devices needed in future applications developments towards fully buried heterostructure device geometry were also pursued. To overcome difficulty of oxidation of Al containing layers at the mesa walls an in-situ etching technique was implemented. Different chemistry approaches were investigated and the first results of lasers devices were reported. / QC 20100930

<p>Silicon carbide rectifiers are commercially available since 2001, and MESFET switches are expected to enter the market within a year. Moreover, three inch SiC wafers can be purchased nowadays without critical defects for the device performance and four inch substrate wafers are announced for the year 2005. Despite this tremendous development in SiC technology, the reliability issues like device degradation or high channel mobility still remain to be solved.</p><p>This thesis focuses on SiC surface passivation and termination, a topic which is very important for the utilisation of the full potential of this semiconductor. Three dielectrics with high dielectric constants, Al2O3, AlN and TiO2, were deposited on SiC with different techniques. The structural and electrical properties of the dielectrics were measured and the best insulating layers were then deposited on fully processed and well characterised 1.2 kV 4H SiC PiN diodes. For the best Al2O3 layers, the leakage current was reduced to half its value and the breakdown voltage was extended by 0.5 kV, reaching 1.6 kV, compared to non passivated devices.</p><p>As important as the proper choice of dielectric material is a proper surface preparation prior to deposition of the insulator. In the thesis two surface treatments were tested, a standard HF termination used in silicon technology and an exposure to UV light from a mercury lamp. The second technique is highly interesting since a substantial improvement was observed when UV light was used prior to the dielectric deposition. Moreover, UV light stabilized the surface and reduced the leakage current by a factor of 100 for SiC devices after 10 Mrad γ ray exposition. The experiments indicate also that the measured leakage currents of the order of pA are dominated by surface leakage.</p>

<p>Long-wavelength (1.3-μm) vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) are of great interest as low-cost, high performance light sources for fiber-optic metro and access networks. During recent years the main development effort in this field has been directed towards all epitaxial GaAs-based structures by employing novel active materials. Different active region candidates for GaAs-based 1.3-μm VCSELs such as GaInNAs/GaAs QWs, GaAsSb QWs or InAs/InGaAs QDs have been investigated. However, the difficult growth and materials properties of these systems have so far hampered any real deployment of the technology. More recently, a new variety of VCSELs have been developed at KTH as based on highly strained InGaAs QWs and negative gain cavity detuning to reach the 1.3-μm wavelength window. The great benefit of this approach is that it is fully compatible with standard materials and processing methods.</p><p>The aim of this thesis is to investigate long-wavelength (1.3-μm) VCSELs using ~1.2-μm In0.4GaAs/GaAs Multiple Quantum Wells (MQWs). A series of QW structures, DBR structures and laser structures, including VCSELs and Broad Area lasers (BALs) were grown by metal-organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) and characterized by various techniques: Photoluminescence (PL), high-resolution x-ray diffraction (XRD), atomic force microscopy (AFM), high accuracy reflectance measurements as well as static and dynamic device characterization. The work can be divided into three parts. The first part is dedicated to the optimization and characterization of InGaAs/GaAs QWs growth for long wavelength and strong luminescence. A strong sensitivity to the detailed growth conditions, such as V/III ratio and substrate misorientation is noted. Dislocations in highly strained InGaAs QW structure and Sb as surfactant assisted in InGaAs QW growth are also discussed here. The second part is related to the AlGaAs/GaAs DBR structures. It is shown that the InGaAs VCSELs with doped bottom DBRs have significantly lower slope efficiency, output power and higher threshold current. By a direct study of buried AlGaAs/GaAs interfaces, this is suggested to be due to doping-enhanced Al-Ga hetero-interdiffusion. In the third part, singlemode, high-performance 1.3-μm VCSELs based on highly strained InGaAs QWs are demonstrated. Temperature stable singlemode performance, including mW-range output power and 10 Gbps data transmission, is obtained by an inverted surface relief technique.</p>

<p>The aim of this thesis work was to fabricate a hybrid LED using organic-inorganic ZnO materials. The goal of the project was to get an efficient white light emission from zinc oxide (ZnO) nanorods active layer. Since most of the organic materials are good for hole mobility and most of the inorganic materials are good for electron mobility, it is possible to fabricate a high performance heterostructure electroluminescence device from organic-inorganic materials. This thesis work was an attempt towards fabricating such a high electroluminescence LED from hybrid materials in which polymer acts as a p-type material and ZnO acts as a n-type material. The growth mechanism of ZnO nanorods using low-temperature aqueous solution method has been studied and nanorods (NRs) growth was examined with scanning electron microscope (SEM). Optimum hole injection polymers have been studied. Finally, the fabricated device was characterized using parameter analyzer. The fabricated device worked as a diode i.e. it rectified current as expected and the desirable light emission has almost been achieved.</p>

The technological interest in a material depends very much on its electrical, magnetic, optical and/or mechanical properties. In carbon nanotubes the atoms form a cylindrical structure with a diameter of the order 1 nm, but the nanotubes can be up to several hundred micrometers in length. This makes carbon nanotubes a remarkable model for one-dimensional systems. A lot of efforts have been dedicated to manufacturing carbon nanotubes, which is expected to be the material for the next generation of devices. Despite all the attention that carbon nanotubes have received from the scientific community, only rather limited progress has been made in the theoretical understanding of their physical properties. In this work, we attempt to provide an understanding of the electron-phonon and electron-defect interactions in semiconducting zigzag carbon nanotubes using a tight-binding approach. The electronic energy dispersion relations are calculated by applying the zone-folding technique to the dispersion relations of graphene. A fourth-nearest-neighbour force constant model has been applied to study the vibrational modes in the carbon nanotubes. Both the electron-phonon interaction and the electron-defect interaction are formulated within the tight-binding approximation, and analyzed in terms of their quantum mechanical scattering rates. Apart from the scattering rates, their components in terms of phonon absorption, phonon emission, backscattering and forward scattering have been determined and analyzed. The scattering rates for (5,0), (7,0), (10,0), (13,0) and (25,0) carbon nanotubes at room temperature and at 10K are presented and discussed. The phonon scattering rate is dependent on the lattice temperature in the interval 0-0.17 eV. We find that backscattering and phonon emission are dominant over forward scattering and phonon absorption in most of the energy interval. However, forward scattering and phonon absorption can be comparable to backscattering and phonon emission in limited energy intervals. The phonon modes associated with each peak in the electron-phonon scattering rates have been identified, and the similarities in the phonon scattering rates between different nanotubes are discussed. The dependence of the defect scattering rate on the tube diameter is similar to that of the phonon scattering rate. Both the phonon and the defect scattering rates show strong dependence on the tube diameter (i.e., the scattering rate decreases as a function of the index of the nanotube). It is observed that the backscattering and forward scattering for electrons interacting with defects occur with same frequency at all energies, in sharp contrast to the situation for phonon scattering. It is demonstrated that the differences in the scattering rate between different tubes are mainly due to the differences in their band structures.