Direct Bandgap Silicon: Tensile-Strained Silicon Nanocrystals

Silicon, a semiconductor underpinning the vast majority of microelectronics, is an indirect-gap material and consequently is an inefficient light emitter. This hampers the ongoing worldwide effort towards the integration of optoelectronics on silicon wafers. Even though silicon nanocrystals are much better light emitters, they retain the indirect-gap nature. Here, we propose a solution to this long-standing problem: silicon nanocrystals can be transformed into a material with fundamental direct bandgap via a concerted action of quantum confinement and tensile strain. We document this transformation by DFT calculations mapping the E(k) band-structure of Si nanocrystals. The experimental proofs are then given firstly by a 10 000x increase in the photon emission rate of strained silicon nanocrystals together with their altered absorbance spectra, both of which point to direct dipole-allowed transitions, secondly by single nanocrystal spectroscopy, confirming reduced phonon energies and thus the presence of tensile strain, and lastly by photoluminescence studies under external hydrostatic pressure