Effects of phase separation and decomposition on the minority carrier diffusion length in AlxGa1-xN films

Combined electron beam induced current and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) measurements have been performed on both undoped and Si-doped AlGaN epitaxial films with aluminum contents x ranging from x = 0 to x = 0.79, in order to correlate the electrical and structural properties of the films. The diffusion length of holes in the films ranges between 0.3 and 15.9 mu m, and the estimated lifetime of holes for doped samples varies between 0.2 ns and 16 mu s. Different effects contribute to the observed increase in the diffusion length with increasing aluminum content. Among others, dislocations seem to be active as nonradiative recombination sites, and phase separation and decomposition as observed by TEM in Al-rich alloys lead to the formation of a spatially indirect recombination path due to the piezoelectric field in the films. Potential fluctuations associated with these phase irregularities could also give rise to electron induced persistent conductivity contributing to the increase of the diffusion length. From our experimental observations, we conclude that the silicon dopants are partially activated in Al-rich alloys, and do not influence significantly the values of the diffusion length of holes in these samples

START as the detector of choice for large-scale muon triggering systems

Further progress in building high-granular large-scale systems based on Scintillation Tiles with MRS APD light readout (START) became possible thanks to the creation of an improved version of MRS APD. The cost of the system may now be significantly reduced by using inexpensive extruded scintillator. More than 160 START samples were assembled based on this design modification and proved to possess 100% MIP detection efficiency and the intrinsic noise rate of less than 0.08 Hz. Long-term stability of START characteristics was confirmed after 3.5 months of operation

New method of studying slow strange meson properties in nuclear matter

We suggest the new experimental method to explore the properties of slow strange mesons at normal nuclear matter density. We show that the $K^{+}$ and $K^{-}$ mesons with extremely small momenta relative to the surrounding medium rest frame can be produced in nucleus-nucleon collisions and their production cross sections are experimentally measurable. The experiments on study of the momentum dependence of meson-nuclear potentials are discussed.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure

Investigation into Photoconductivity in Single CNF/TiO2-Dye Core–Shell Nanowire Devices

A vertically aligned carbon nanofiber array coated with anatase TiO2 (CNF/TiO2) is an attractive possible replacement for the sintered TiO2 nanoparticle network in the original dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) design due to the potential for improved charge transport and reduced charge recombination. Although the reported efficiency of 1.1% in these modified DSSC’s is encouraging, the limiting factors must be identified before a higher efficiency can be obtained. This work employs a single nanowire approach to investigate the charge transport in individual CNF/TiO2 core–shell nanowires with adsorbed N719 dye molecules in dark and under illumination. The results shed light on the role of charge traps and dye adsorption on the (photo) conductivity of nanocrystalline TiO2 CNF’s as related to dye-sensitized solar cell performance