This project will aim to study systematically the effects of rare earth ion incorporation into the structure of discrete silicon nanoparticles of varying size. The nanoparticles will be prepared by the co-pyrolysis of disilane and a rare earth precursor complex in a high temperature aerosol reactor. The nanoparticles will be characterized by high- and low-resolution photoluminescence spectroscopy, transmission and high resolution electron microscopy, and ultraviolet and visible absorption spectroscopy. The study will include an emphasis on the rare earth ions erbium and europium as large rare-earth doped silicon nanoparticles in the 12 to 100 nanometer size regime, as well as in the small rare-earth doped silicon nanoparticle 1 to 4 nanometer size regime. The goals include evaluating the role of the silicon host particle size on the photophysical properties of the rare earth center, especially energy transfer, and assessing the possibility of large silicon nanoparticles acting as optical cavities for the enhancement of rare earth ion luminescence. %%% This project aims to establish the fundamental physical and chemical properties, to include optical and magnetic properties of nanoparticles that strongly depend on not only the chemical composition, but also on the size of the particle. From progress in this area of nanosciences it is predicted that circuits and devices based on nanoclusters exhibiting novel optical, magnetic and electronic properties will enable the shrinkage of a computational or information storage unit to near molecular dimensions as well as decrease the power requirements of these units orders of magnitude less than currently needed.
