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Structural and optical properties of non-polar ZnO/Zn0.81Mg0.19O multiple quantum wells grown on \(r\)-plane sapphire substrates by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy

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Abstract

This work investigates the structural and optical properties of non-polar ZnO/Zn0.81Mg0.19O multiple quantum wells (MQWs), which have been prepared on \(r\)-plane sapphire substrates by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). The MQWs are (\(11\bar{2}0\)) oriented (\(a\)-plane) as identified by the X-ray diffraction pattern. Structural properties are anisotropic and surfaces of MQWs show stripes running along the ZnO \(c\)-axis direction. Sharp interfaces between the well layers and barrier layers can be clearly resolved by the secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) analysis. The room-temperature photoluminescence (PL) resulting from the well regions exhibits a significant blueshift with respect to ZnO single layer. Exciton emission in the ZnO QW is resolved into two components in the temperature dependence of the PL spectra. Two types of excitons are responsible for this feature. The excitons trapped by the potential minima dominate at low temperature, and the excitons localized in the “free exciton states” dominate at relatively high temperature. An activation energy of 7.3 meV for quenching of the exciton emission is in good agreement with the transition of the two types of excitons.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. 51172204 and 51002134, Zhejiang Provincial Public Technology Research of China under Grant No. 2012C21114, Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No. LQ13E020001, and Doctoral Fund of Ministry of Education of China under Grant No. 2011010110013.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Silicon Materials, Cyrus Tang Center for Sensor Materials and Applications, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310027, People’s Republic of China

    W. Chen, X. H. Pan, H. H. Zhang, P. Ding, H. P. He, J. Y. Huang, B. Lu & Z. Z. Ye

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  1. W. Chen
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  2. X. H. Pan
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  3. H. H. Zhang
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Correspondence to X. H. Pan or Z. Z. Ye.

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Structural and optical properties of non-polar ZnO/Zn\(_{0}.81\)Mg0.19O multiple quantum wells grown on \(r\)-plane sapphire substrates by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy (PDF 1.7 MB)

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Chen, W., Pan, X.H., Zhang, H.H. et al. Structural and optical properties of non-polar ZnO/Zn0.81Mg0.19O multiple quantum wells grown on \(r\)-plane sapphire substrates by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy. Appl. Phys. A 115, 817–821 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00339-013-7865-2

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