Telecom light-emitting diodes based on nanoconfined self-assembled silicon-based color centers

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the electrical control of silicon-based color centers embedded in diodes, enabling stable near-infrared light emission for potential quantum and classical optoelectronic applications.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method to embed and electrically drive nanoconfined silicon color centers within silicon diodes, advancing integrated silicon photonics.

Findings

Electrically pumped light emission from silicon color centers was achieved.

Emission intensity increases exponentially with current until saturation.

Spectral homogeneity of the emitters improves under electrical driving.

Abstract

Silicon color centers (SiCCs) have recently emerged as potential building blocks for light emitters in Si photonics, quantum emitters with spin storage capabilities, and Si-based quantum repeaters. We have recently developed a non-invasive method to engineer carbon-related SiCCs confined to ultra-thin nanolayers within a pristine crystalline environment, which is of utmost importance for the photostability of SiCCs. Here, we demonstrate embedding these C-doping-based SiCCs into the only 9 nm wide intrinsic region of a p-i-n diode using the epitaxial self-assembly of color centers. We report electrically-pumped light emission with an exponential increase in the intensity as a function of the driving current until saturation. We associate this property with the shift of quasi-Fermi-level position upon electrical driving, which simultaneously improves the spectral homogeneity of the engineered SiCCs. Our study demonstrates the electrical control and driving of near-infrared emitters in high-quality silicon diodes, an essential milestone for advancing classical and quantum optoelectronics.