Last Developments in Luminescence of Porous Silicon

Abstract

ABSTRACTIt is shown that visible photoluminescence and electroluminescence can be obtained from porous silicon layers. Room temperature photoluminescence is readily obtained from as-formed high porosity samples. Light emission at wavelengths as short as 560 nm can be observed after further thinning of the silicon pore walls by dissolution in HF under illumination. Silicon walls can also be thinned by an electrochemical oxidation process, this method allowing to use layers of rather low porosities (65%) which thus gives good mechanical properties to the samples. The thinning of the already very small size crystallites of porous silicon leads to quantum size effects which are at the origin of the light emission far above the band gap of silicon. Photoluminescence decay characteristics suggest that a tunnelling effect could be involved in the recombination mechanism of photogenerated charge carriers. Bright electroluminescence during anodic oxidation of porous silicon has been also evidenced. The influence of the porosity, of the layer thickness and of the anodic current density on the integrated electroluminescence intensity are described in detail.