Role of Ge nanoclusters in the performance of photodetectors compatible with Si technology

In this work, we investigate the spectral response of metal-oxide-semiconductor photodetectors based on Ge nanoclusters (NCs) embedded in a silicon dioxide (SiO2) matrix. The role of GeNC size and density on the spectral response was evaluated by comparing the performance of PDs based on either densely packed arrays of 2 nm-diameter NCs or a more sparse array of 8 nm-diameter Ge NCs. Our Ge NC photodetectors exhibit a high spectral responsivity in the 500-1000 nm range with internal quantum efficiency of similar to 700% at -10 V, and with NC array parameters such as NC density and size playing a crucial role in the photoconductive gain and response time. We find that the configuration with a more dispersed array of NCs ensures a faster photoresponse, due to the larger fraction of electrically-active NCs and the partial suppression of recombination centers. The photoconduction mechanism, assisted by trapping of photo-generated holes in Ge NCs, is discussed for different excitation power and applied bias conditions. Our results provide guidelines for further optimization of high-efficiency Ge NC photodetectors.