Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation
Doping is an important and routine method to tune the properties of semiconductors. Dopants accumulated at grain boundaries (GBs) can exert a profound influence on microstructures and transport properties of heat and charge. To unravel the effect of dopant accumulation at GBs on the scattering of el...
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Wiley-VCH
2025-03-01
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| Series: | Small Science |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1002/smsc.202300299 |
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| author | Huaide Zhang Minghao Shen Christian Stenz Christian Teichrib Riga Wu Lisa Schäfer Nan Lin Yiming Zhou Chongjian Zhou Oana Cojocaru‐Mirédin Matthias Wuttig Yuan Yu |
| author_facet | Huaide Zhang Minghao Shen Christian Stenz Christian Teichrib Riga Wu Lisa Schäfer Nan Lin Yiming Zhou Chongjian Zhou Oana Cojocaru‐Mirédin Matthias Wuttig Yuan Yu |
| author_sort | Huaide Zhang |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Doping is an important and routine method to tune the properties of semiconductors. Dopants accumulated at grain boundaries (GBs) can exert a profound influence on microstructures and transport properties of heat and charge. To unravel the effect of dopant accumulation at GBs on the scattering of electrons, individual high‐angle GBs in three PbSe samples doped with different amounts of Cu using a home‐designed correlative characterization platform combining electron backscatter diffraction, microcircuit transport property measurements, and atom probe tomography are studied. The findings reveal that the segregation of Cu dopants to GBs reduces the GB potential barrier height. Once the GB phase reaches an equilibrium with saturated Cu, the extra Cu dopants distribute homogeneously inside the grains, compensating for vacancies and improving the electrical conductivity of the PbSe grains. The results correlate the Cu distribution at GBs and grains with local electrical properties, enlightening strategies for manipulating advanced functional materials by GB segregation engineering. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-8d45d7cee47641249a9f1ca32c0f10e1 |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2688-4046 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-03-01 |
| publisher | Wiley-VCH |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Small Science |
| spelling | doaj-art-8d45d7cee47641249a9f1ca32c0f10e12025-08-20T03:11:31ZengWiley-VCHSmall Science2688-40462025-03-0153n/an/a10.1002/smsc.202300299Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant SegregationHuaide Zhang0Minghao Shen1Christian Stenz2Christian Teichrib3Riga Wu4Lisa Schäfer5Nan Lin6Yiming Zhou7Chongjian Zhou8Oana Cojocaru‐Mirédin9Matthias Wuttig10Yuan Yu11Institute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyState Key Laboratory of Solidification Processing, and Key Laboratory of Radiation Detection Materials and Devices Ministry of Industry and Information Technology Northwestern Polytechnical University Xi'an 710072 ChinaDepartment of Sustainable Systems Engineering (INATECH) Albert‐Ludwigs‐Universität Freiburg 79110 Freiburg GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyInstitute of Physics (IA) RWTH Aachen University Sommerfeldstraße 14 52074 Aachen GermanyDoping is an important and routine method to tune the properties of semiconductors. Dopants accumulated at grain boundaries (GBs) can exert a profound influence on microstructures and transport properties of heat and charge. To unravel the effect of dopant accumulation at GBs on the scattering of electrons, individual high‐angle GBs in three PbSe samples doped with different amounts of Cu using a home‐designed correlative characterization platform combining electron backscatter diffraction, microcircuit transport property measurements, and atom probe tomography are studied. The findings reveal that the segregation of Cu dopants to GBs reduces the GB potential barrier height. Once the GB phase reaches an equilibrium with saturated Cu, the extra Cu dopants distribute homogeneously inside the grains, compensating for vacancies and improving the electrical conductivity of the PbSe grains. The results correlate the Cu distribution at GBs and grains with local electrical properties, enlightening strategies for manipulating advanced functional materials by GB segregation engineering.https://doi.org/10.1002/smsc.202300299charge carrier scatteringdopant segregationsgrain boundarylattice plainificationmetavalent bonding |
| spellingShingle | Huaide Zhang Minghao Shen Christian Stenz Christian Teichrib Riga Wu Lisa Schäfer Nan Lin Yiming Zhou Chongjian Zhou Oana Cojocaru‐Mirédin Matthias Wuttig Yuan Yu Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation Small Science charge carrier scattering dopant segregations grain boundary lattice plainification metavalent bonding |
| title | Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation |
| title_full | Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation |
| title_fullStr | Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation |
| title_full_unstemmed | Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation |
| title_short | Improved Charge Carrier Transport Across Grain Boundaries in N‐type PbSe by Dopant Segregation |
| title_sort | improved charge carrier transport across grain boundaries in n type pbse by dopant segregation |
| topic | charge carrier scattering dopant segregations grain boundary lattice plainification metavalent bonding |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1002/smsc.202300299 |
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