Long lifetime, high density single-crystal erbium compound nanowires as a high optical gain material

Erbium-containing materials of long lifetime and high Er density are important for achieving strong luminescence and high optical gain in compact integrated photonics devices. We have systematically studied the lifetime and crystal quality as a function of growth conditions for an erbium compound that we recently reported, erbium chloride silicate (ECS). The lifetime for the best quality ECS nanowires can be as long as 540 μs, the longest for high-density Er-materials, representing a lifetime-density product as high as 8.7 × 1018 s cm−3. Such high density, long lifetime erbium materials can find many interesting applications such as compact lasers or amplifiers.