Time-Resolved Correlative Optical Microscopy of Charge-Carrier Transport, Recombination, and Space-Charge Fields in CdTe Heterostructures

From time- and spatially resolved optical measurements, we show that extended defects can have a large effect on the charge-carrier recombination in II-VI semiconductors. In CdTe double heterostructures grown by molecular beam epitaxy on the InSb (100)-orientation substrates, we characterized the extended defects and found that near stacking faults the space-charge field extends by 2-5 μm. Charge carriers drift (with the space-charge field strength of 730-1,360 V cm⁻¹) and diffuse (with the mobility of 260 ± 30 cm² V⁻¹ s⁻¹) toward the extended defects, where the minority-carrier lifetime is reduced from 560 ns to 0.25 ns. Therefore, the extended defects are nonradiative recombination sinks that affect areas significantly larger than the typical crystalline grains in II-VI solar cells. From the correlative time-resolved photoluminescence and second-harmonic generation microscopy data, we developed a band-diagram model that can be used to analyze the impact of extended defects on solar cells and other electronic devices.