Optoelectronic devices and components articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    The detection of terahertz and millimeter waves has many applications, but there are still limitations in their technical performance. Here, Tong et al. demonstrate the direct detection of long-wavelength radiation through surface plasmon excitation and a corresponding improvement in detection performance.

    • Jinchao Tong
    • , Wei Zhou
    •  & Dao Hua Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Frequency-stable laser systems are important for many applications, like optical communications, that require high precision and low noise. Here, Idjadi and Aflatouni demonstrate that the widely used Pound-Drever-Hall technique can be fully integrated on-chip, miniaturizing the stabilization setup.

    • Mohamad Hossein Idjadi
    •  & Firooz Aflatouni

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Plasmon-induced hot electrons have potential applications spanning photodetection and photocatalysis. Here, Hoang et al. study the interplay between hot electrons generated by localized and propagating plasmons, and demonstrate wavelength-controlled polarity-switchable photoconductivity

    • Chung V. Hoang
    • , Koki Hayashi
    •  & Hiroaki Misawa

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The performance of silicon single-photon avalanche detectors is currently limited by the trade-off between photon detection efficiency and timing jitter. Here, the authors demonstrate how a CMOS-compatible, nanostructured, thin junction structure can make use of tailored light trapping to break this trade-off.

    • Kai Zang
    • , Xiao Jiang
    •  & James S. Harris

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Single-material monolithic optoelectronic integrated circuits via CMOS compatible low-temperature approaches are crucial to the continued development of post-Moore electronics. Liuet al., report carbon nanotube based electrically driven 3D monolithic optoelectronic integrated circuits.

    • Yang Liu
    • , Sheng Wang
    •  & Lian-Mao Peng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The breaking of parity-time symmetric gain and loss profiles can be used to achieve single-mode lasing in coupled microring resonators. Here, Liuet al. show that this effect can be electrically controlled with a tunable lasing wavelength and strong sidemode suppression.

    • Weilin Liu
    • , Ming Li
    •  & Jianping Yao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Harvesting incident photons with energy below the bandgap may lead to highly efficient solar cells. By introducing InAs quantum dots at the hetero-interface, Asahiet al. achieve efficient two step photon up-conversion resulting in additional photocurrent and very high external quantum efficiency.

    • Shigeo Asahi
    • , Haruyuki Teranishi
    •  & Takashi Kita

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Efficient implementation of quantum dot and well architectures are restricted to costly vacuum-epitaxially-grown semiconductors. The authors use quantum dots in perovskite to build field-emission photodiodes that are sensitive across the visible and into the short-wavelength infrared.

    • F. Pelayo García de Arquer
    • , Xiwen Gong
    •  & Edward Sargent

  • Article
    | Open Access

    There is emerging interest in photodetectors in the mid-infrared driven by increasing need to monitor the environment for security and healthcare purposes. Sassiet al. show a thermal photodetector, based on the coupling between graphene and a pyroelectric crystal, which shows high temperature sensitivity.

    • U. Sassi
    • , R. Parret
    •  & A. Colli

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hybrid polariton states originating from the strong coupling of photonic and excitonic states hold promise for control of nonlinear light behaviour. Here, the authors fabricate a microcavity containing organic dye and WS2, featuring hybrid polaritons arising from both Frenkel and Wannier-Mott excitons.

    • Lucas C. Flatten
    • , David M. Coles
    •  & Jason M. Smith

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Transparent conductors are fundamental for optoelectronics. Using the transfer matrix method to optimise a multistructure of anti-reflection coatings containing an ultrathin metal film, Maniyaraet al. achieve the highest transmittance of an antireflection transparent conductor combined with low resistance.

    • Rinu Abraham Maniyara
    • , Vahagn K. Mkhitaryan
    •  & Valerio Pruneri

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Metasurfaces have the potential to be used in imaging systems since they can modify optical wavefronts at subwavelength spatial resolution. Here, Arbabi et al. demonstrate a metasurface lens doublet corrected for monochromatic aberrations, and integrate it with an image sensor to realize a miniature planar camera.

    • Amir Arbabi
    • , Ehsan Arbabi
    •  & Andrei Faraon

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The thermal-draw technique offers fibre devices with a multiplicity of geometries, but these are constrainted to being translationally symmetric. Here, the authors disrupt this symmetry by applying selective capillary instability, resulting in electrically connected spherical photodetecting elements.

    • Michael Rein
    • , Etgar Levy
    •  & Yoel Fink

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The detection of low-energy photons may be enabled by devices that make use of the excess thermal energy from photoexcited carriers as a result of light absorption. Here the authors demonstrate a vertical graphene-WSe2-graphene heterostructure that takes advantage of the photo-thermionic effect.

    • M. Massicotte
    • , P. Schmidt
    •  & F. H. L. Koppens

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Scaling of photonic devices requires materials with sufficiently strong elecro-optic effects. Here, Schoen et al.demonstrate and analyze single electrically induced switching events that can operate in the visible with a small active volume using electron energy loss in a scanning transmission electron microscope.

    • David T. Schoen
    • , Aaron L. Holsteen
    •  & Mark L. Brongersma

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Active metamaterials are largely controlled by light, preventing integration in electronic systems. Here, the authors introduce electroluminescent metamaterials based on metal nano-inclusions hybridized with colloidal quantum dots and use this approach to weave intricate light-emitting surfaces.

    • Quynh Le-Van
    • , Xavier Le Roux
    •  & Aloyse Degiron

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Visual evidence for photo-induced ionic migration in perovskite films without contacts is lacking. Here, the authors use a unique combination of confocal photoluminescence microscopy and chemical imaging to correlate the local changes in photophysics with composition in CH3NH3PbI3films under illumination.

    • Dane W. deQuilettes
    • , Wei Zhang
    •  & Samuel D. Stranks

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Electrochromism, the dependence of light absorption upon electronic control, finds a wide range of applications in smart materials. Here, Liu et al. show an electrochromic DNA–surfactant liquid crystal system that exhibits electrically tunable optical absorption and thermally tunable memory.

    • Kai Liu
    • , Justin Varghese
    •  & Andreas Herrmann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The recombination dynamics of photogenerated carriers in organolead trihalide perovskites are not well understood. Here, He et al.report that the recombination of photogenerated carriers in solution-processed methylammonium-lead-halide films is dominated by excitons weakly localized in band tail states.

    • Haiping He
    • , Qianqian Yu
    •  & Zhizhen Ye

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nano-apertures cannot distinguish between distinct spin-states of photons because of information loss upon light-aperture interaction. Here, Du et al.report a subwavelength aperture integrated with metasurfaces which breaks spin degeneracy and produces opposite transmission spectra over a broad spectral range.

    • Luping Du
    • , Shan Shan Kou
    •  & Jiao Lin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Organic semiconductors with high mobility and strong fluorescence are necessary for optoelectronic devices. Here, Liu et al. show an organic semiconductor, 2,6-diphenylanthracene, satisfying both requirements with mobility of 34 cm2 V−1 s−1 and emission of 6,627 cd m−2at a turn-on voltage of 2.8 V.

    • Jie Liu
    • , Hantang Zhang
    •  & Alan J. Heeger

  • Article
    | Open Access

    An imbalance in I/Pb stoichiometry is thought to lead to defects in metal halide films. Here, Zhang et al. show that the addition of hypophosphorous acid in the precursor solution can significantly improve the film quality and enhance the photoluminescence intensity, leading to improved photovoltaic devices.

    • Wei Zhang
    • , Sandeep Pathak
    •  & Henry J. Snaith

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Single crystals of organolead halide perovskites exhibit large carrier mobilities and long diffusion lengths. Here, the authors succeed in growing the single crystals on planar substrates and integrate them as the active layer of visible photodetectors with a large gain-bandwidth product.

    • Makhsud I. Saidaminov
    • , Valerio Adinolfi
    •  & Osman M. Bakr

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Graphene has excellent electronic properties but its photoresponsivity is limited by low absorption and the ultrafast recombination of photoexcited carriers. Here, the authors demonstrate fast, high responsivity and broadband photodetectors by combining graphene with single-wall carbon nanotubes.

    • Yuanda Liu
    • , Fengqiu Wang
    •  & Rong Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The use of organic–inorganic metal-halide perovskites in hot-carrier devices depends on deepening the understanding of photoexcitations in these materials. Here, Price et al. use transient absorption spectroscopy to study hot-carrier distributions in CH3NH3PbI3and quantify key semiconductors parameters.

    • Michael B. Price
    • , Justinas Butkus
    •  & Felix Deschler

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Ultrathin semiconductor metafilms can be designed to achieve near-unity absorption in specific spectral regions. Here, Kim et al. engineer nanoscale optical resonances in sub-50-nm-thick germanium nanobeams metafilms to demonstrate near-unity absorption in one or more desired wavelength regions.

    • Soo Jin Kim
    • , Pengyu Fan
    •  & Mark L. Brongersma

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hybrid organic–inorganic perovskites have shown great potential for use in optoelectronic applications. Here, the authors create solution-processed lead iodide perovskite light-emitting field-effect transistors and demonstrate both ambipolar behaviour and gate-assisted electroluminescence.

    • Xin Yu Chin
    • , Daniele Cortecchia
    •  & Cesare Soci

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Black phosphorus is an atomically thin material that exhibits excellent properties for electronics applications, but these degrade in atmospheric conditions. Here, the authors demonstrate the fabrication of stable, ultra-clean and high-mobility black phosphorus sandwiched between the layers of boron nitride.

    • Xiaolong Chen
    • , Yingying Wu
    •  & Ning Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Periodically strained monolayer molybdenum disulphide funnels photogenerated electron-hole pairs across an electric field induced by a spatially graded band gap, mimicking a crystal of artificial atoms. Here, the authors experimentally demonstrate the artificial crystal in strain-textured molybdenum disulphide.

    • Hong Li
    • , Alex W. Contryman
    •  & Xiaolin Zheng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Chlorine incorporation into CH3NH3PbI3improves solar cell performance, but its optoelectronic role is still unclear. Here the authors present a strategy that decouples the morphological impact, to reveal that chlorine incorporation affects carrier transport across the heterojunction interface rather than within the perovskite crystal.

    • Qi Chen
    • , Huanping Zhou
    •  & Yang Yang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Metal halide perovskites are promising for solar energy harvesting, but currently prone to a large hysteresis and current instability. Here, Xu et al. show improvements in a hybrid material in which the fullerene is distributed at perovskite grain boundaries and thus passivates defects effectively.

    • Jixian Xu
    • , Andrei Buin
    •  & Edward H. Sargent

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Active control of light in optical fibres is of great interest, to this end, electric control of all-fibre graphene devices is desirable but highly challenging. Here, Lee et al. demonstrate electric control of the optical properties of a graphene sheet deposited on a side-polished fibre mediated by an ion liquid.

    • Eun Jung Lee
    • , Sun Young Choi
    •  & Dong-Il Yeom

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Aligned, one-dimensional, single-crystal materials may allow on-demand photon/electron transfer. Here, the authors use a physical vapour transport technique to grow organic single-crystal wires with the guidance of pillar-structured substrates, and perform proof of concept waveguide experiments.

    • Yuchen Wu
    • , Jiangang Feng
    •  & Lei Jiang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Bulk contributions to transport measurements often inhibit the study of the surface states of topological insulators. Here, Kastl et al. demonstrate high-fidelity helicity-dependent photocurrents in the surface states of Bi2Se3, controlled via circularly polarized light with a picosecond time-resolution.

    • Christoph Kastl
    • , Christoph Karnetzky
    •  & Alexander W. Holleitner

  • Article |

    Molybdenum disulphide is a two-dimensional material that, unlike graphene, has a nonzero bandgap. Here, the authors demonstrate that the bandgap of single-layer molybdenum disulphide grown on graphite by chemical vapour deposition changes with distance from the grain boundary

    • Yu Li Huang
    • , Yifeng Chen
    •  & Andrew T. S. Wee

  • Article |

    Although synthesis of high-quality MoS2 has been demonstrated, growth of monolayer MoS2at controlled locations is highly desirable for applications. Here, the authors introduce a method where patterned seeds of molybdenum source material are used to grow isolated flakes at predetermined locations.

    • Gang Hee Han
    • , Nicholas J. Kybert
    •  & A. T. Charlie Johnson

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Quadrature amplitude modulation signalling is currently enabling rapid data transfer capacity growth, but it still has associated drawbacks. Here, Liu et al.use optical injection locking to generate complex modulation format signals with reduced consumption, small footprint and easy integration.

    • Zhixin Liu
    • , Joseph Kakande
    •  & Radan Slavík

  • Article |

    Two-dimensional photocurrent spectroscopy can identify coherent electronic dynamics and offers promise for studies of numerous material systems. Karki et al. now show that the method can be used to study ultrafast carrier processes in lead sulphide quantum dots, such as multiple exciton generation.

    • Khadga J. Karki
    • , Julia R. Widom
    •  & Andrew H. Marcus

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