Kinetic Control of Self-Catalyzed Indium Phosphide Nanowires, Nanocones, and Nanopillars

Abstract

The morphological phase diagram is reported for InP nanostructures grown on InP (111)B as a function of temperature and V/III ratio. Indium droplets were used as the catalyst and were generated in situ in the metalorganic vapor-phase epitaxy reactor. Three distinct nanostructures were observed: wires, cones, and pillars. It is proposed that the shape depends on the relative rates of indium phosphide deposition via the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) and vapor-phase epitaxy (VPE) processes. The rate of VLS is relatively insensitive to temperature and results in vertical wire growth starting at 350 degrees C. By contrast, the rate of VPE accelerates with temperature and drives the lateral growth of cones at 385 degrees C and then pillars at 400 degrees C.

Epitaxial InP nanowire growth from Cu seed particles

“…Transition metals and group III metal particles for self-catalyzed nanowire growth are promising candidates. On the latter a lot of research is ongoing [5][6][7]. The former, including Cu and Al, have served as seed particle materials for Si and Ge nanowires with good results, i.e.…”

Self-catalyzed vapor–liquid–solid growth of InP/InAsP core–shell nanopillars

“…The pillars are short and fat due to the relatively high growth temperature. This shape can be explained by the competition between two growth mechanisms: vapor-liquidsolid (VLS), which occurs primarily in the vertical direction; and vapor phase epitaxy (VPE), which occurs mainly in the lateral direction [27]. According to our previous study, the VPE rate increases relative to the VLS rate as one raises the substrate temperature.…”

“…Relatively few publications have considered self-catalysis of III/V nanowires using group III liquid droplets. In our group, we have shown that InP nanowires, nanocones, and nanopillars can be grown using indium droplets on InP(1 1 1)B by precisely controlling the growth temperature and V/III ratio [27].…”

Fabrication, spectroscopy, and dynamics of highly luminescent core–shell InP@ZnSe quantum dots

“…InP is a direct band-gap semiconductor and has a bulk band-gap energy of 1.35 eV. Many groups have spent considerable time and effort on the solution phase synthesis of InP nanoparticles using diverse methods such as a dehalosilylation reaction method or a hot injection technique [17][18][19][20]. However, InP nanocrystals synthesized in organic solutions show quite low band-edge photoluminescence due to surface traps, dangling bonds, stacking faults, and a high activation barrier for carrier detrapping [21][22][23].…”