A way to obtain visible blue light emission in porous silicon

Strong blue emission around 435 nm from porous silicon (PS) embedded in Pb(Zr-x,Ti1-x)O-3 (PZT) is realized, which is stable and clearly visible to the naked eye even after exposure in an ambient atmosphere for a year. The sample is obtained by hydrothermal etching of (100)-oriented single crystal silicon wafers in an HF aqueous solution, followed by pulsed laser ablation deposition of a PZT thin layer on the surface of the PS. The electrons and holes excited from silicon nanocrystallites could be separated by the PZT-induced electrostatic field and migrate to the boundaries of PS/PZT along opposite directions, respectively. Therefore, the blue emission is interpreted in terms of the recombination of excited carriers from the silicon nanocrystallites in the interfacial region of PS/PZT. (C) 2003 American Institute of Physics.