Self-Seeded MOCVD Growth and Dramatically Enhanced Photoluminescence of InGaAs/InP Core–Shell Nanowires

We report on the growth and characterization of InGaAs/InP core–shell nanowires on Si–(111) substrates by metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD). The strain at the core–shell interface induced by the large lattice mismatch between the InGaAs core and InP shell materials has strong influence on the growth behavior of the InP shell, leading to the asymmetric growth of InP shell around the InGaAs core and even to the bending of the nanowires. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) measurements reveal that the InP shell is coherent with the InGaAs core without any misfit dislocations. Furthermore, photoluminescence (PL) measurements at 77 K show that the PL peak intensity from the InGaAs/InP core−shell nanowires displays a ∼ 100 times enhancement compared to the only InGaAs core sample without InP shell due to the passivation of surface states and effective carrier confinement resulting from InP shell layer. The results obtained here further our understanding of the growth behavior of strained core–shell heterostructure nanowires and may open new possibilities for applications in InGaAs/InP heterostructure nanowire-based optoelectronic devices on Si platform.