Direct Growth of Hexagonal Boron Nitride on Photonic Chips for High-Throughput Characterization

• DOI: 10.1021/acsphotonics.1c00165
• Publication Date: 2021-06-28T21:10:12Z
• Authors: Evgenii Glushkov; Noah Mendelson; Andrey Chernev; Ritika Ritika; Martina Lihter; Reza R. Zamani; Jean Comtet; Vytautas Navikas; Igor Aharonovich; Aleksandra Radenovic
• Keywords: 0301 basic medicine; Condensed Matter - Materials Science; Physics - Instrumentation and Detectors; optically active defects; [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-GEN-PH] Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/General Physics [physics.gen-ph]; 2d materials; Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci); FOS: Physical sciences; Instrumentation and Detectors (physics.ins-det); [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-GEN-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/General Physics [physics.gen-ph]; chemical vapor deposition; 03 medical and health sciences; imaging platform; [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-INS-DET] Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Instrumentation and Detectors [physics.ins-det]; localization microscopy; [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-INS-DET]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Instrumentation and Detectors [physics.ins-det]; hexagonal boron nitride; defects; Physics - Optics; Optics (physics.optics)

Adapting optical microscopy methods for nanoscale characterization of defects in two-dimensional (2D) materials is a vital step for photonic on-chip devices. To increase the analysis throughput, waveguide-based on-chip imaging platforms have been recently developed. Their inherent disadvantage, however, is the necessity to transfer the 2D material from the growth substrate to the imaging chip which introduces contamination, potentially altering the characterization results. Here we present a unique approach to circumvent these shortfalls by directly growing a widely-used 2D material (hexagonal boron nitride, hBN) on silicon nitride chips, and optically characterizing the defects in the intact as-grown material. We compare the direct growth approach to the standard wet transfer method, and confirm the clear advantages of the direct growth. While demonstrated with hBN in the current work, the method is easily extendable to other 2D materials.