Optically Active Erbium with Co-dopants in Silicon

Erbium impurity centers in silicon with strong optical emission properties in the near-Infrared are being sought for efficient silicon-based light sources because of the inherent advantages of integrating silicon photonics with VLSI technology. This work reports investigations of adding proper co-dopants to erbium in silicon through a cost-effective combination of techniques, comprising physical vapor co-deposition, implantation doping, ion beam mixing, and thermal annealing. Processed samples are characterized optically by photoluminescence and structurally by Rutherford backscattering.