Enhanced nitrogen incorporation by pulsed laser annealing of GaNxAs1-x formed by N ion implantation

Journal ArticleWe demonstrate that pulsed laser annealing followed by rapid thermal annealing greatly enhances incorporation of substitutional N in N1-implanted GaAs. Films implanted to 1.8% N exhibit a fundamental band gap of 1.26 eV (a band gap reduction of 160 meV), corresponding to an N activation efficiency of 50%. The optical and crystalline quality of the synthesized film is comparable to GaNxAs1-x thin films of similar composition grown by epitaxial growth techniques. Compared to films produced by N1 implantation and rapid thermal annealing only, the introduction of pulsed laser annealing improves N incorporation by a factor of 5. Moreover, we find that the synthesized films are thermally stable up to an annealing temperature of 950 °C

Carrier concentration dependencies of magnetization & transport in Ga1-xMnxAs1-yTey

Journal ArticleWe have investigated the transport and magnetization characteristics of Ga1-xMnxAs intentionally compensated with shallow Te donors. Using ion implantation followed by pulsed-laser melting, we vary the Te compensation and drive the system through a metal-insulator transition (MIT). This MIT is associated with enhanced low-temperature magnetization and an evolution from concave to convex temperature-dependent magnetization

Synthesis and optical properties of II-O-VI highly mismatched alloys

Journal ArticleWe have synthesized ternary and quaternary diluted II-VI oxides using the combination of O ion implantation and pulsed laser melting. CdOxTe12x thin films with x up to 0.015, and the energy gap reduced by 150 meV were formed by O1-implantation in CdTe followed by pulsed laser melting. Quaternary Cd0.6Mn0.4OxTe12x and Zn0.88Mn0.12OxTe12x with mole fraction of incorporated O as high as 0.03 were also formed. The enhanced O incorporation in Mn-containing alloys is believed to be due to the formation of relatively strong Mn-O bonds. Optical transitions associated with the lower (E2) and upper (E1) conduction subbands resulting from the anticrossing interaction between the localized O states and the extended conduction states of the host are clearly observed in these quaternary diluted II-VI oxides. These alloys fulfill the criteria for a multiband semiconductor that has been proposed as a material for making high efficiency, single-junction solar cells

Mutual passivation of group IV donors and nitrogen in diluted GaNxAs1 x alloys

Journal ArticleWe demonstrate the mutual passivation phenomenon of Ge donors and isovalent N in highly mismatched alloy GaNxAs1-x doped with Ge. Layers of this alloy were formed by the sequential implantation of Ge and N ions followed by pulsed laser melting and rapid thermal annealing. The mutual passivation effect results in the electrical deactivation of GeGa donors (Ge on Ga sites) and suppression of the NAs (N on As sites) induced band gap narrowing through the formation of GeGa-NAs nearest neighbor pairs. These results in combination with the analogous effect observed in Si-doped GaNxAs1-x provide clear evidence of the general nature of the mutual passivation phenomenon in highly mismatched semiconductor alloys

Diluted II-VI oxide semiconductors with multiple band gaps

Journal ArticleWe report the realization of a new mult-band-gap semiconductor. Zn1-yMnyOxTe1-x alloys have been synthesized using the combination of oxygen ion implantation and pulsed laser melting. Incorporation of small quantities of isovalent oxygen leads to the formation of a narrow, oxygen-derived band of extended states located within the band gap of the Zn1-yMnyTe host. When only 1.3% of Te atoms are replaced with oxygen in a Zn0:88Mn0:12Te crystal the resulting band structure consists of two direct band gaps with interband transitions at ~1:77 and 2.7 eV. This remarkable modification of the band structure is well described by the band anticrossing model. With multiple band gaps that fall within the solar energy spectrum, Zn1-MnyOxTe1-x is a material perfectly satisfying the conditions for single-junction photovoltaics with the potential for power conversion efficiencies surpassing 50%

Synthesis and properties of highly mismatched II-O-I alloys

Journal ArticleTernary and quaternary dilute II-VI oxides were synthesised using a highly nonequilibrium method: the combination of O ion implantation and pulsed-laser melting. CdOxTe12x thin films have been produced with x up to 0.015 and with the energy gap reduced by 0.15 eV. Optical transitions corresponding to both the lower (E-) and upper (E+) conduction sub-bands, resulting from the anticrossing interaction between the localised O states and the extended conduction states of the matrix, are clearly observed in quaternary Cd0.6Mn0.4OxTe1-x and Zn0.88Mn0.12OxTe1-x layers. These results have important implications for the existing theoretical models of the electronic structure of the highly mismatched alloys. In Zn1-xMnxTe, where the O level lies below the conduction band edge, it was demonstrated that incorporation of a small amount of oxygen leads to the formation of a narrow, oxygen-derived band of extended states located well below the conduction band edge of the ZnMnTe matrix. The three absorption edges of this material (~0.73, 1.83 and 2.56 eV) cover the entire solar spectrum providing a material envisioned for multiband, single-junction, high-efficiency photovoltaic devices

Synthesis of GaNxAs1-x thin films by pulsed laser melting and rapid thermal annealing of N+-implanted GaAs

Journal ArticleWe present a systematic investigation on the formation of the highly mismatched alloy GaNxAs1-x using N1-implantation followed by a combination of pulsed laser melting and rapid thermal annealing. Thin films of GaNxAs1-x with x as high as 0.016 and an activation efficiency of the implanted N up to 50% have been synthesized with structural and optical properties comparable to films grown by epitaxial deposition techniques with similar substitutional N content. The effects of N1 implantation dose, laser energy fluence, and rapid thermal annealing temperature on the N incorporation as well as optical and structural properties of the GaNxAs1-x films are discussed

Effect of film thickness on the incorporation of Mn interstitials in Ga1-xMnxAs

Journal ArticleWe have investigated the effect of film thickness on the distribution of Mn atoms at various lattice sites in Ga1−xMnxAs thin films. We find that the growth surface acts as a sink facilitating the outdiffusion of Mn interstitials sMnId, and thus reducing its concentration in the film. The outdiffused MnI accumulate on the surface in a surface oxide layer and do not participate in the ferromagnetism of the film. For thin films less than 15 nm thick, no MnI can be detected. Because of the absence of compensating MnI defects, higher TC can be achieved for such extremely thin Ga1−xMnxAs layers. These results agree with our previously suggested Fermi-level-governed upper limit of the TC of III-Mn-V ferromagnetic semiconductors

Evaluation of the Importance of Time-Frequency Contributions to Speech Intelligibility in Noise

Recent studies on binary masking techniques make the assumption that each time-frequency (T-F) unit contributes an equal amount to the overall intelligibility of speech. The present study demonstrated that the importance of each T-F unit to speech intelligibility varies in accordance with speech content. Specifically, T-F units are categorized into two classes, speech-present T-F units and speech-absent T-F units. Results indicate that the importance of each speech-present T-F unit to speech intelligibility is highly related to the loudness of its target component, while the importance of each speech-absent T-F unit varies according to the loudness of its masker component. Two types of mask errors are also considered, which include miss and false alarm errors. Consistent with previous work, false alarm errors are shown to be more harmful to speech intelligibility than miss errors when the mixture signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is below 0 dB. However, the relative importance between the two types of error is conditioned on the SNR level of the input speech signal. Based on these observations, a mask-based objective measure, the loudness weighted hit-false, is proposed for predicting speech intelligibility. The proposed objective measure shows significantly higher correlation with intelligibility compared to two existing mask-based objective measures

Structural insights into the gating of DNA passage by the topoisomerase II DNA-gate.

Type IIA topoisomerases (Top2s) manipulate the handedness of DNA crossovers by introducing a transient and protein-linked double-strand break in one DNA duplex, termed the DNA-gate, whose opening allows another DNA segment to be transported through to change the DNA topology. Despite the central importance of this gate-opening event to Top2 function, the DNA-gate in all reported structures of Top2-DNA complexes is in the closed state. Here we present the crystal structure of a human Top2 DNA-gate in an open conformation, which not only reveals structural characteristics of its DNA-conducting path, but also uncovers unexpected yet functionally significant conformational changes associated with gate-opening. This structure further implicates Top2's preference for a left-handed DNA braid and allows the construction of a model representing the initial entry of another DNA duplex into the DNA-gate. Steered molecular dynamics calculations suggests the Top2-catalyzed DNA passage may be achieved by a rocker-switch-type movement of the DNA-gate