Objective
"Plasmonics has received a lot of attention because of the unique optical properties of metal nanostructures that allow, for example, strong focusing of light and strong field enhancements. While plasmonics is widely proposed for improving performances of optoelectronic devices, its applicability still has to be proven. Photodetectors are well-established for different applications ranging from digital photography to biomedical imaging. However, because of their versatile use there is a great demand for low-cost devices. One way to achieve low-cost photodetectors is by employing solution-processed quantum dots as active material. Quantum dots are a promising medium because of the tunability of the absorption spectrum by varying their size due to the quantum confinement effect and because of the low-cost fabrication technique due to their solution processability. However, the performance of quantum dot photodetectors has been limited so far to either being ultra-sensitive, but rather slow, or high-speed with a low sensitivity.
We will break this compromise by concentrating light into nanoscale semiconducting volumes by employing plasmonic structures. Therefore, we will numerically simulate the interaction between the incident light, the plasmonic structure, and the absorbing quantum dots, by using commercial simulation software. In a next step, we will fabricate the plasmonic structures and we will determine an optical absorption enhancement by measuring the photoluminescence of the quantum dots in the vicinity of the plasmonic structure. In a final step, we will fabricate the actual photodetector and characterize its performance by optoelectronical measurements."
Fields of science
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensorsoptical sensors
- natural sciencesphysical sciencesopticsspectroscopyabsorption spectroscopy
- natural sciencescomputer and information sciencessoftwaresoftware applicationssimulation software
Topic(s)
Call for proposal
FP7-PEOPLE-2011-IEF
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
MC-IEF - Intra-European Fellowships (IEF)Coordinator
08860 Castelldefels
Spain