Heavily Doped Zinc Oxide with Plasma Frequencies in the Telecommunication Wavelength Range

Abstract

Heavy and hyper doping of ZnO by a combination of gallium (Ga) ion implantation using a focused ion beam (FIB) system and post‐implantation laser annealing is demonstrated. Ion implantation allows for the incorporation of impurities with nearly arbitrary concentrations, and the laser‐annealing process enables dopant activation close to or beyond the solid‐solubility limit of Ga in ZnO. Heavily doped ZnO:Ga with free‐carrier concentrations of ≈1021 cm−3, resulting in a plasma wavelength of 1.02 μm, which is substantially shorter than the telecommunication wavelength of 1.55 μm is demonstrated. Thus, this approach enables the control of the plasma frequency of ZnO from the far infrared down to 1.02 μm, thus, providing a promising plasmonic material for applications in this regime.

Keywords

• hyper doping
• ion implantation
• laser annealing
• non-equilibrium
• plasmonics