A novel electrochemical approach for fabrication of photoluminescent erbium-doped porous silicon

We report a novel electrochemical doping (ECD) approach for porous silicon (PS) with rare earths, constant-potential electrolysis, and a new electrolyte solution system. The doped erbium concentration was high: up to 10²¹ /cm³. After this new ECD treatment, PS:Er was found to emit much more intense room-temperature visible photoluminescence than both the porous silicon control and the PS:Er prepared by constant-current ECD. Room-temperature IR photoluminescence around 1.54 μm was observed for the first time without any post-doping annealing.