Mediation of Interface Dipoles on SiO_x/Si Nanowire Based Inorganic/Organic Hybrid Photodetectors with Enhanced Wavelength‐Selective Sensing Performances

Abstract The promising hybrid photodetector design is realized through the incorporation of PEDOT:PSS layer with SiO_x/Si nanowires (SiNWs), which went beyond the intrinsic limitation of band‐gap associated photosensing characteristics of conventional Si semiconductors toward revolutionarily turning into wavelength‐selective features. These can be interpreted by two determining effects. First, the effective trapping of incident lights with wavelength of 590 nm is evidenced on SiO_x/SiNWs. Besides, the creation of interfacial potentials, arising from the positively charged PEDOT:PSS and negatively charged SiO_x, manifested the reduction of electron density at PEDOT:PSS surfaces and in turn raised the work function. These features explicitly modulated the carrier‐transport characteristics at hybrid heterojunctions, which accounted for the suppression of photocurrents under light excitations with wavelengths of either 365 nm or 850 nm. The established photodetectors with optimal oxidation treatment resulted in the substantial improvement of both device responsivity and detectivity above 11 times beyond the PEDOT:PSS/SiNWs designs, which shed new light on practical applications of hybrid photodetectors.