1. Introduction
Photodetectors (PDs), which convert light into electrical signals, play a crucial role in various fields such as data transmission [
1], night vision imaging [
2], wearable devices [
3], military applications [
4,
5]. For the visible light detection, silicon (Si) photodetectors have been the main platform due to its compatibility with CMOS technology and all the advances occurred in technology for integration with photonic and electronic platforms. The main challenge for Si PDs is due to its fixed band gap width of 1.1 eV and the limited detection range to cover broad band applications beyond visible light region. When it comes to near infrared (NIR) and short–wavelength infrared (SWIR) several material systems have been used for detection; each of those material systems has its own advantages and disadvantages. II-IV material system, and technologically matured mercury–cadmium–telluride (HgCdTe) is capable of detection of the entire infrared spectral range, [
6,
7,
8,
9] but certain issues, such as complex material growth and fabrication processes [
10,
11] are still limiting factors. High performance III-V materials such as In
xGa
1-xAs compounds photodetectors (if lattice–matched to InP substrate) are great candidate for NIR and SWIR photodetection, but their performance sometimes is drastically affected by mismatch–induced defects for certain wavelengths [
12,
13]. A strained layer superlattice III-V based material is also another strong candidate for infrared photodetection [
14,
15,
16,
17], this material is under development to deliver high performance for NIR and SWIR detection [
18,
19].
Various two dimensional (2D) materials such as transition metal disulfide (TMD) [
20], metal nitrides/carbonitrides (MXenes) [
21], hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) [
21], perovskite [
22] and graphene [
23,
24] has been implemented in photodetectors to improve the photodetection and imaging in the broad range of electromagnetic spectrum and infrared detection [
25,
26]. Graphene and graphene-based materials hold suitable optical and electrical properties which lend itself toward novel applications in photo detection. Graphene provides an opportunity for low cost, large area, broad band photodetectors given to high-speed operation (∼1.5 THz), low carrier effective mass and high mobility (2x10
5 cm
2 V
−1 S
−1) [
27,
28,
29]. However, a single layer graphene (SLG) absorbs only 2.3% of light, which is exceptional for a mono layer material but not sufficient for high efficiency IR detection device. On the other hand, its zero-bandgap nature not helping to keep the dark current low, which poses a serious limitation for practical applications. Alternative structures such as forming graphene heterojunctions with other 2D materials [
30,
31], introducing lateral confinement [
32], applying an electric field perpendicular to a heterojunction [
33] and chemical doping [
34] have been proposed for band gap opening in graphene. Amongst those various approached, intercalation doping of graphene with ferric chloride (FeCl
3) has been theoretically and experimentally confirmed to be an effective method to reduce the sheet resistance of few-layer graphene (FLG), tune the fermi surface of graphene while maintains its transparency [
35,
36,
37,
38]. FeCl
3 intercalated few-layer graphene (IFLG) also is highly stable in ambient conditions as well as high humidity and temperatures environment and can be used to define photo-active junctions. Here we took the advantage of magnetic field assisted pulsed laser deposition (MFPLD) technique for growth of high quality FLG and intercalated chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) grown IFLG with FeCl3 to obtain a graphene-based device to operate in NIR region of electromagnetic spectrum. The details of fabrication presented here along with the operation of photodetector based on the mechanism of photodetection and charge transfer in the active region of illuminated device.
3. Results and Discussion
The Raman spectroscopy of the graphene grown by MFPLD is shown in
Figure 4. In
Table 1 the important peaks and ratios are depicted. There were four peaks at around 1358, 1582, 2670, and 2890 cm
-1. The peak at 1358 cm
-1 is disorder peak (D). The G (graphitic) peak at ~1582 cm
−1 is associated with the doubly degenerate phonon mode (E
2g symmetry) and is related to the in-plane C-C stretching in sp
2 sites inclusive of sp
2 chains and rings [
43]. The peak at around 2670 cm
-1 is the D-peak over tone and known as 2D peak. This peak is sensitive to number of layers and is closely linked to the details of the electronic band structure [
40]. The I
2D/I
G ratio and the 2D band shape show formation of FLG in MFPLD and it can be deduced that, there were less than 5 layers in all samples. The I
2D/I
G ratio is more than 50%, which corresponds to the growth of bi and tri layers graphene [
44,
45,
46].
To understand the chemical properties of the graphene under the influence of magnetic field, attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy of the sample have been analysed (
Figure 5).
The weak band intensities of –C–O (alkoxy) and –C–O (epoxy) groups at 1020 cm
–1 and 1180 cm
–1, respectively, were mainly due to the negligible dangling bond in the sample. In this condition, most of the oxygen groups will functionalize the edge of the graphene planes without producing lattice distortions and defects at the basal planes [
47]. In the graphene oxide there is a dominant peak at around 1711 cm
-1 which belongs to C
O bond and normally is used to obtain the amount of oxygen in the structure [
48]. The lack of this peak in the grown structures indicates the lack of noticeable oxygen in the structure of the grown graphene.
Figure 6. gives Raman spectra of FLG and IFLG in three different zones. FeCl
3 has eight Ramanactive
modes 4A
g+4E
g [
49]. In FeCl
3 intercalant graphene, only four Raman modes, 2A
1g and 2E
g, were
observed at 93 cm
-1, 139 cm
-1, 181 cm
-1 and 287 cm
-1. The shift of the peaks as compared to bulk FeCl
3
is in agreement with previous reports [
41,
49] and further validate the intercalation process (Figure
6a). The position of G peak is used for the staging. The I2D/IG ratio in the CVD graphene before
intercalation is ~ 0.37, which is corresponding to the growth of 3–4 layers of graphene [
50,
51].
G bands shift to ∼1625 cm
-1 in IFLG in
Figure 6b is also a confirmation of the intercalation for 3 or 4 layers of graphene. IFLG enhanced optical and electrical properties of graphene and is known as a new material normally called as graphexeter [
52]. This material can be used to define photo-active junctions with an unprecedented property. The FeCl
3 layer sandwiched between two graphene layers accepts electrons from both adjacent layers, leading to hole-doped graphene [
53,
54]. It is well known that the strong charge-transfer between graphene and FeCl
3 molecules induces large p-doping of graphene and drastically changes the carriers’ dynamics. The Photodetector was fabricated through wet transfer of graphene grown by MFPLD and IFLG to the TAM surface (
Figure 7a and 7b).
After characterization of grown graphene and transfer process for the device, optical and electrical measurement performed. Responsivity is a figure of merit of a photodetector and is defined as the output signal divided by the input optical power. If the output signal type is current, then the current responsivity is the ratio of photocurrent I
ph and incident power:
where I
ph (Amper) is the output signal of the detector and P
in (Watt) is the input optical power. A more useful parameter in measurement of the photodetector is quantum efficiency (QE) which describes the optical performance by determining the percentage of the photons arriving on the detector, generated photo-carriers, and contribute to the photocurrent. QE is defined as the number of (e–h) pairs per second collected to produce the photocurrent I
ph, divided by the number of incident/absorbed photons per second. Therefore, it can be written as QE = (I
ph/q)/ϕ
in where q is the electron charge, ϕ
in = P
in/E
ph. The incoming photon flux ϕ
in is related to incident photon energy h
v and power P
in, thus we get the following known equation for QE calculation:
The responsivity and the QE of the photodetector spectra of the photodetector in NIR region at -0.5 negative bias voltages at 300 oK is presented in Figs. 8(a) and (b) respectively.
The highest responsivity was obtained with a maximum of 130 mA/W at λ = 1700 nm and the corresponding 9.5% QE in the device under investigation. To find out the reason for the obtained results we need to find out the mechanism of photocurrent formation and transformation in IFLG and FLG. The intercalation of graphene with FeCl
3 modifies the electronic transport properties in graphene by accepting electrons from the top and the bottom graphene layers and turn them into a p-type. In addition, the intercalation increases the effective distance between the graphene layers and thus the electronic structure of IFLG becomes similar to that of SLG. The additional electronic states introduced in IFLG facilitate photoexcited electron transition between lower and higher energy levels with the assistance of optical phonons. Optical phonons can be emitted and reabsorbed by the carriers in the higher energy states, thus slowing down the energy relaxation of the photoexcited electrons. This emission and reabsorption of optical phonons causes the number of photoexcited electrons to be built up slowly [
55]. The intercalants in the graphene structure act as a transient energy reservoir which results in the back-and-forth inelastic scattering of nonequilibrium electrons, causing a retardation of the internal thermalization. This effect has been reported in similar structures and can create a strong photovoltage at the IFLG/FLG interfaces [
52]. Photothermoelectric effect is the origin of the observed signal at the interface between IFLG/FLG. At the interface, there is an asymmetric heating and therefore, a temperature gradient is created [
56]. This leads to the diffusion of the hot carriers from the IFLG to the FLG layer. This charge motion yields a Seebeck voltage across the source-drain contacts, giving rise to the enhanced photothermoelectric effect inside each FLG. The reported temperature difference of around T = 5 K [
56], poses as a good reason that IFLG-FLG NIR photodetectors exhibit a responsivity of R = 130 mV/W. It should be noted that due to the significant shift in the Dirac point which is an indication of the metallic behavior of IFLG a very limited gate modulation effect is reported in the similar devices. However, applying a negative bias to the FLG contact enhances the induced injection of photo-excited holes from the IFLG into FLG. If similar metal contacts implemented for applying a bias voltage to the graphene photodetectors, due to the semi-metal behavior of graphene, the bias voltage would drive a large dark current and a strong shot noise which is a serious limitation for the device performance. With the application of an electric bias, the charge transfer takes place between FeCl
3 and graphene. Therefore, the FeCl
3 band can shift and contract as the magnitude of electric bias increases. Therefore, it is possible to control the hole doping of the FeCl
3 intercalation by the electric bias [
37]. The tapered design of microelectrodes in TAM creates a nonuniform electric field through the interface of IFLG/FLG. This non uniform electric field is stronger in FLG/TAM and getting weaker as we get away from the contact. The nonuniform field sweep the created photo carriers toward the contact and improves the efficiency of the photodetector.
Specific detectivity (D*) is another figure of merit of photodetector which can be expressed as [
57]:
where A is the area of the detector in unit of cm
2, ∆
f is the bandwidth of the measuring instrument, and
in is the system noise. This quantity can be interpreted as the signal to noise ratio from a 1 cm
2 detector illuminated with 1Watt of incident radiant power, with a noise equivalent bandwidth of 1 Hz. Based on the following equation for the average of system noise:
and using current-voltage characteristics, the general expression for D*can be written as [
57,
58]:
where J
dc is the dark current density, and the RA is the differential resistance-area product. The dark current of the device at various temperature is given in the supporting information. In this approach, the noise other than thermal and shot noise is ignored. To increase the D*, a balance and optimization for higher responsivity and corresponding quantum efficiency, lower dark current density, and larger RA are desired.
The specific detectivity of the device at 300
oK is shown in
Figure 9a (detectivity values at different temperature is provided in the Supporting information). At 300
oK, the photodetector exhibits a maximum detectivity of 1.3 x 10
7 Jones at 1.7 mm. As the temperature decreases, the Fermi distribution blurs, which, according to the theory, leads to an increase in dI
ph/dT inversely proportional to temperature, and hence to an increase in the photocurrent. In
Figure 9b the specific detectivity is presented at different temperatures from 150 to 300 K, demonstrating a raise with decreasing the temperature, as expected. With the applying bias to the device and band gap opening of IFLG, it is expected that charge transfer between FeCl
3, graphene and IFLG/FLG increases since the IFLG resistivity is dropping with lowering the temperature.