Pyro-Phototronic Effect Enhanced Pyramid Structured p-Si/n-ZnO Nanowires Heterojunction Photodetector

The emergence of nanomaterials has brought about the development of miniature photodetectors into a new stage, and ZnO nanomaterials are currently one of the most popular research objects. Here, the performance of a photodetector consisting of micropyramid structured p-Si/n-ZnO NWs heterojunction constructed by an anisotropic chemical etching and hydrothermal method is optimized by using the pyro-phototronic effect, and the photoresponses of the device to 405 and 648 nm lasers are investigated. The results show that, with the introduction of pyro-phototronic effect, the photoresponsivity R_pyro increases to 208 times that of R_photo when the wavelength is 405 nm and the optical power density is 0.0693 mW/cm². Moreover, with the increase of the chopper frequency, the photocurrent increases by more than 3 times, and the photoresponsivity is also increased by a factor of 4.5, making it possible to detect ultrafast pulsed light. In addition, in order to increase the current collection efficiency, a thin film Al layer was deposited as the back electrode on the basis of the device, and the photocurrent and photoresponsivity are significantly improved. Finally, the coupling between the pyro-phototronic effect and the piezo-phototronic effect is analyzed by applying compressive strain to the photodetector. When the compressive strain is −1.02%, the photocurrent decreases by 31.4% and the photoresponsivity decreases by 27.9% due to the opposite direction between laser illumination induced pyroelectric polarization charges and compressive strain induced piezoelectric polarization charges. This work not only demonstrates the great potential of pyro-phototronic effect in enhancing the silicon-based heterojunction photodetectors for high-performance photodetection and ultrafast pulsed light detection but also provides assistance for a better understanding of the coupling mechanism between pyro-phototronic and piezo-phototronic effects.