Study of luminescent centers in ZnO nanorods catalytically grown on 4H-p-SiC

High-quality ZnO nanorods (NRs) were grown by the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) technique on 4H-p-SiC substrates. Heterojunction light emitting diodes (LEDs) were fabricated. Electrical characterization including deep level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) complemented by photoluminescence (PL) is used to characterize the heterojunction LEDs. In contrast to previously published results on n-ZnO thin films on p-SiC, we found that the dominant emission is originating from the ZnO NRs. Three luminescence lines have been observed; these are associated with blue (465 nm) and violet (446 nm) emission lines from ZnO NRs emitted by direct transition/recombination of carriers from the conduction band to a zinc vacancy (V-Zn) radiative center and from a zinc interstitial (Zn-i) radiative center to the valance band. The third green-yellow (575 nm) spectral line is emitted due to a transition of carriers from Zn-i to V-Zn. The superposition of these lines led to the observation of strong white light which appears as a wide band in the room temperature PL.