Controlling the persistence of photoconductivity through additional sub-bandgap photoexcitation in individual m-axial GaN nanowires

The persistence of photoconductivity after switching off the photoexcitation is investigated in individual m-axial n-GaN nanowires as a function of temperature. At room temperature, photoconductivity is found to decay with a time scale of several hours. The capture barrier height is estimated to be ∼ 450 meV from the stretched exponential fitting of the decay characteristics recorded at different temperatures. This energy value is found to be much less than the surface band-bending energy of ∼ 770 meV, which is believed to act as the capture barrier in this system. This finding indicates the tunneling of electrons through the top part of the band-bending barrier. Interestingly, the decay rate of photoconductivity is observed to reduce significantly when the photoconductivity in these wires is quenched by an additional sub-bandgap illumination prior to the switching off the photoexcitation. A rate equation model is proposed to explain the upward band bending at the surface as well as the persistent photoconductivity effect in terms of the transfer of holes between the valence band and acceptor-type surface states of the nanowires. Photoconductivity decay profiles simulated from the model are found to match very well with the experimental data recorded at different temperatures in both quenched and unquenched cases.