The feasibility of producing erbium‐doped silicon light‐emitting diodes by molecular beam epitaxy is demonstrated. The p‐n junctions are formed by growing an erbium‐doped p‐type epitaxial silicon layer on an n‐type silicon substrate. When the diodes are biased in the forward direction at 77 K they show an intense sharply structured electroluminescence spectrum at 1.54 μm. This luminescence is assigned to the internal 4f–4f transition 4I13/2→4I15/2 of Er3+ (4f11).

1.54‐μm electroluminescence of erbium‐doped silicon grown by molecular beam epitaxy

A survey of the recent progress on the properties of transition-metal impurities in the most common III-V compounds GaAs, InP and GaP is presented. A summary of experimental techniques available for identifying deep centers and/or locating deep levels in the band gap is given. The author concentrates on 3d isolated impurities, giving the known energy levels of Fe-group substitutional impurities in the three compounds. Complexes involving these impurities are also considered. In addition, 4d, 5d and rare earth impurities are briefly discussed.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0022-3719/18/19/005/pdf

Transition-metal impurities in III-V compounds

Using a tunable color center laser, photoluminescence excitation measurements were performed on GaAs:Er grown by molecular‐beam epitaxy. These measurements show that only one type of Er3+ center is responsible for the sharply structured emission band at 1.54 μm. The multiplicity of the zero‐phonon lines indicates that this Er3+ center has lower than cubic symmetry and that the luminescence arises from the intracenter transition 4I13/2→4I15/2 of Er3+ (4f 11).

Photoluminescence excitation measurements on GaAs:Er grown by molecular‐beam epitaxy

The characteristic 1.54‐μm emission from the rare‐earth element erbium implanted in GaAs, InP, and GaP was investigated through 10‐K photoluminescence essentially as a function of anneal temperature, time, and method. The strip‐heater, forming‐gas, and quartz‐ampoule anneal methods were utilized in the range of 400 to 1000 °C. Erbium‐related emissions were observed from 1.48 to 1.64 μm and were observable at emission temperatures of up to 260 K for InP:Er and 296 K for GaP:Er and GaAs:Er. Out of the three semiconductors, GaAs:Er was observed to exhibit the highest optical activation using a square‐profile implantation technique. Dependent on the anneal method, optimum Er emissions occurred between 650 and 800 °C for GaAs, for InP between 575 and 625 °C, and for GaP between 800 and 950 °C. In general, the forming‐gas anneal method proved most successful; however, maximum luminescence including sharper emission lines was achieved through the strip‐heater method. This method, with an anneal time of 10 s, sho...

Photoluminescence optimization and characteristics of the rare-earth element erbium implanted in GaAs, InP, and GaP

We propose a new type of current injection semiconductor laser with rare‐earth dopant in the active layer for achieving stable, single longitudinal mode operation. In this laser, the rare‐earth/semiconductor combination is chosen such that the wavelengths of the dominant emission from the trivalent rare‐earth ion internal 4f‐4f  transitions are shorter than that of the band‐edge emission of the host semiconductor. Spectrally, the narrow optical gain due to the rare‐earth ion transition will superimpose on top of the broad gain peak of the host semiconductor. Such laser diodes will attain lasing action at the rare‐earth transition wavelength resulting in single longitudinal mode operation with conventional Fabry–Perot cavity. Furthermore, reproducible precise lasing wavelength insensitive to temperature variation should be possible. Such a proposed rare‐earth/semiconductor injection laser was investigated with erbium doping in the GaInAsP (λ=1.55 μm) active layer of the heteroepitaxial ridge‐overgrown lase...

H. Ennen

Papers

Rare earth activated luminescence in InP, GaP and GaAs