Friday, 18 March, 2011

Sound makes nanowires blink

 

© Nano Lett., doi: 10.1021/nl1042775 (2011)

Like copper wires in our everyday life, nanowires are envisioned to act as interconnecting elements in future electronic circuits on the nanoscale. Moreover, when made from semiconductors these nanowires not only transport electric current along their axis but also can very efficiently emit light. In a recent publication in Nano Letters, a team of NIM researchers from groups of Hubert Krenner and Achim Wixforth at University of Augsburg and Gregor Koblmüller, Gerhard Abstreiter and Jonathan Finley at the Walter Schottky Institut at TU Munich combines these two fundamental properties. The scientists demonstrate that the light emitted from a single semiconductor nanowire can be periodically turned on and off at high speeds, faster than a nanosecond. For this purpose the physicists developed a hybrid device in which a radio frequency sound wave propagates along the nanowire and dynamically turns on and off its light emission. (NIM Press release, March 18, 2011)

Press information (NIM)
Publication "Directional and Dynamic Modulation of the Optical Emission of an Individual GaAs Nanowire Using Surface Acoustic Waves"