Photoconduction efficiencies of metal oxide semiconductor nanowires: The material's inherent properties

Abstract

The photoconduction (PC) efficiencies of various single-crystalline metal oxide semiconductor nanowires (NWs) have been investigated and compared based on the materials' inherent properties. The defined PC efficiency (normalized gain) of SnO2 NWs is over one to five orders of magnitude higher than that of its highly efficient counterparts such as ZnO, TiO2, WO3, and GaN. The inherent property of the material allowed the photoconductive gain of an SnO2 single-NW photodetector to easily reach 8 × 108 at a low bias of 3.0 V and a low light intensity of 0.05 Wm−2, which is the optimal reported value so far for the single-NW photodetectors. The probable physical origins, such as charged surface state density and surface band bending, that caused the differences in PC efficiencies and carrier lifetimes are also discussed.