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The III-V semiconductor InGaAs is a key material for photonics because it provides optical emission and absorption in the 1.55 μm telecommunication wavelength window. However, InGaAs suffers from pronounced nonradiative effects associated with its surface states, which affect the performance of nanophotonic devices for optical interconnects, namely nanolasers and nanodetectors. This work reports the strong suppression of surface recombination of undoped InGaAs/InP nanostructured semiconductor pillars using a combination of ammonium sulfide, (NH4)2S, chemical treatment and silicon oxide, SiOx, coating. An 80-fold enhancement in the photoluminescence (PL) intensity of submicrometer pillars at a wavelength of 1550 nm is observed as compared with the unpassivated nanopillars. The PL decay time of ∼0.3 μm wide square nanopillars is dramatically increased from ∼100 ps to ∼25 ns after sulfur treatment and SiOx coating. The extremely long lifetimes reported here, to our knowledge the highest reported to date for undoped InGaAs nanostructures, are associated with a record-low surface recombination velocity of ∼260 cm/s. We also conclusively show that the SiOx capping layer plays an active role in the passivation. These results are crucial for the future development of high-performance nanoscale optoelectronic devices for applications in energy-efficient data optical links, single-photon sensing, and photovoltaics.

We demonstrate an efficiency enhancement of an InP nanowire (NW) axial p-n junction solar cell by cleaning the NW surface. NW arrays were grown with in situ HCl etching on an InP substrate patterned by nanoimprint lithography, and the NWs surfaces were cleaned after growth by piranha etching. We find that the postgrowth piranha etching is critical for obtaining a good solar cell performance. With this procedure, a high diode rectification factor of 10(7) is obtained at ±1 V. The resulting NW solar cell exhibits an open-circuit voltage (Voc) of 0.73 V, a short-circuit current density (Jsc) of 21 mA/cm(2), and a fill factor (FF) of 0.73 at 1 sun. This yields a power conversion efficiency of up to 11.1% at 1 sun and 10.3% at 12 suns.

Approaching the theoretically limiting open circuit voltage (V-oc) of solar cells is crucial to optimize their photovoltaic performance. Here, we demonstrate experimentally that nanostructured layers can achieve a fundamentally larger Fermi level splitting, and thus a larger V-oc, than planar layers. By etching tapered nanowires from planar indium phosphide (InP), we directly compare planar and nanophotonic geometries with the exact same material quality. We show that the external radiative efficiency of the nanostructured layer at 1 sun is increased by a factor 14 compared to the planar layer, leading to a 70 mV enhancement in V-oc. The higher voltage arises from both the enhanced outcoupling of photons, which promotes radiative recombination, and the lower active material volume, which reduces bulk recombination. These effects are generic and promise to enhance the efficiency of current record planar solar cells made from other materials as well.