Effects of spacer thickness on optical properties of stacked Ge/Si quantum dots grown by chemical vapor deposition

Abstract

Photoluminescence investigations on stacked Ge/Si dots with different spacer thicknesses are presented. According to the emission energy shift in the Ge dots, we found that a thinner spacer layer will lead to remarkable Ge–Si intermixing during the stacking of the Ge/Si dots. Such material intermixing not only shallows the dot potential depth, but also softens the sharpness of the dot/spacer interface. In addition, the temperature of photoluminescence quenching also varies with the spacer thickness. Finally, we point out some important factors that are relevant to the room-temperature luminescence efficiency of stacked Ge/Si quantum dots.