Engineering the composition, morphology, and optical properties of InAsSb nanostructures via graded growth technique

Graded growth technique is utilized to realize the control over the composition, morphology, and optical properties of self-assembled InAsSb/InGaAs/InP nanostructures. By increasing the initial mole fraction of the Sb precursor during the graded growth of InAsSb, more Sb atoms can be incorporated into the InAsSb nanostructures despite the same Sb mole fraction averaged over the graded growth. This leads to a shape change from dots to dashes/wires for the InAsSb nanostructures. As a result of the composition and morphology change, photoluminescence from the InAsSb nanostructures shows different polarization and temperature characteristics. This work demonstrates a technologically important technique—graded growth, to control the growth and the resultant physical properties of self-assembled semiconductor nanostructures.