Deforming germanium to emit more light

A team of researchers from INAC and Leti are exploring a variety of processes to deform germanium as much as possible to dope the material’s light-emitting capacity, paving the way for use in laser emission. The team’s latest article focused on the use of a constrained silicon nitride layer to deform germanium nanowires. The nanowires are deposited and then the supporting area ablated to transform them into suspended structures. The constraint is thus transferred from the silicon nitride to the germanium nanowires.

ESRF’s X-ray diffraction capabilities and optical spectrometry were used to measure the deformation of these nanowires at 1.5%. The result is expected to improve substantially thanks to germanium-on-insulator research in progress under the CEA technological research and materials science divisions’ flagship projects Laser Ge and Operando.

Contact: kevin.guilloy@cea.fr

Facebook

Twitter