| Abstract | This chapter discusses a number of diverse approaches for engineering efficient light emission in silicon. These different approaches are placed in context and their prospects, for application in silicon based opto-electronics. The general requirements in silicon (Si)-based light sources are efficient light-emitting diodes, lasers, and optical amplifiers for use in optical communications technologies, such as fiber optics and displays. Silicon crystallizes in the diamond structure, which consist of two interpenetrating face-centered cubic lattices displaced from each other by one-quarter of the body diagonal. The chapter also elaborates on the material's engineering that is now being applied to Si in an attempt to overcome the indirect band gap limitations in light emission from Si. The aim is to increase the efficiency of the luminescence by increasing the overlap of the electron and hole wavefunctions, to tune the wavelength of the emission by forming alloys, molecules, and clusters, or to induce recombination at impurity centers. This chapter concludes with a discussion on prospects for silicon-based optoelectronic devices. |
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