Large enhancement of photocurrent gain based on the composite of a single n-type SnO_2 nanowire and p-type NiO nanoparticles

Abstract

The high sensitivity of photodetector in the UV range based on the composite consisting of a single SnO(2) nanowire and NiO nanoparticles has been demonstrated. The underlying mechanism is attributed to the formation of p-NiO and n-SnO(2) heterojunction on the nanowire surface. The enhanced space charge region owing to the existence of p-n heterojunction increases the surface electric field, which will improve the separation of photogenerated electrons and holes, and the photoresponse gain will be greatly enhanced. This work shows a new approach that by decorating suitable p-type nanoparticles on n-type nanowires, the photoresponse gain can be enhanced drastically. Our result should be useful for creating novel high efficiency photodetectors.

Ultrahigh-gain single SnO2 nanowire photodetectors made with ferromagnetic nickel electrodes

“…When the magnetic field increases, the amount of the accumulated electrons is larger, and thus, the high-resistance zone near the surface of NW also becomes larger. 22,23 To be more quantitative, let us consider the Hall effect. The value of the Hall electric field E B can be expressed as…”

“…To improve the sensitivity of the devices, SnO 2 NW has been functionalized with several different materials including catalytically active metals, p-type semiconductors, and semiconductor quantum dots. [20][21][22][23][24] Through these previous efforts, the photocurrent (PC) gain of SnO 2 NW devices can be not only greatly enhanced but also extended to a wider photoresponse spectrum range. In this paper, we provide an alternate approach to enhance the sensitivity of a single SnO 2 NW photodetector that has two ferromagnetic nickel (Ni) electrodes.…”

Strain Engineering to Modify the Electrochemistry of Energy Storage Electrodes

“…2e ) are observed to exhibit similar recoverable shifts in the Raman modes that can be correlated with strain and straightforwardly identified. The low intensities of the observed Ni-O stretch modes 44 45 46 near 508 cm −1 and 571 cm −1 prohibited quantitative analysis on these modes.…”

Hybrid Nanostructures for Photodetectors

“…As a result, it is expected that the integration of semiconducting nanoparticles with 1D nanowire leads to enhanced photodetecting performance. As an example, an individual SnO 2 nanowire decorated with p‐type NiO nanoparticles based photodetector reported by Chen et al exhibited an enhanced photocurrent gain as high as 3500, as compared with pristine SnO 2 . The authors attributed the improved performance to a p–n heterojunction formed on the decorated surface, which result in enhanced space charge region.…”