Journal of Nanomaterials
Volume 2016, Article ID 9674741, 7 pages
http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2016/9674741
Influence of Radiation on the Luminescence of Silicon Nanocrystals Embedded into SiO2 Film
1V.Ye. Lashkaryov Institute of Semiconductor Physics, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Prosp. Nauki 41, Kyiv 03028, Ukraine
2Institute of Physics, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Prosp. Nauki 46, Kyiv 03028, Ukraine
Received 14 July 2016; Revised 5 November 2016; Accepted 13 November 2016
Academic Editor: Giuseppe Compagnini
Copyright © 2016 I. P. Lisovskyy et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
Influence of γ-irradiation on light emission properties of silicon nanocrystals imbedded into SiO2 film is investigated. It was shown that small doses of γ-irradiation (103–105 rad) lead to enhancement of photoluminescence intensity in the nc-Si/SiO2 samples. This effect was explained by radiation induced passivation of recombination active centers on the nanocrystals surface. High doses of irradiation (~107 rad) lead to the photoluminescence intensity decrease up to 2 times. Radiation treatment of silicon oxide films with embedded amorphous silicon inclusions resulted only in the decrease of the photoluminescence intensity within the whole range of doses (103–5 × 107 rad). Radiation defects resulting in partial quenching of photoluminescence are characterized with the distributed activation energy of annealing with the peak position at ~0.96 eV and the frequency factor 107 s−1. The nature of such defects and the mechanisms of their creation are discussed.