Near-infrared Schottky silicon photodetectors based on two dimensional materials

Since its discovery in 2004, graphene has attracted the interest of the scientific community due to its excellent properties of high carrier mobility, flexibility, strong light-matter interaction and broadband absorption. Despite of its weak light optical absorption and zero band gap, graphene has demonstrated impressive results as active material for optoelectronic devices. This success pushed towards the investigation of new two-dimensional (2D) materials to be employed in a next generation of optoelectronic devices with particular reference to the photodetectors. Indeed, most of 2D materials can be transferred on many substrates, including silicon, opening the path to the development of Schottky junctions to be used for the infrared detection. Although Schottky near-infrared silicon photodetectors based on metals are not a new concept in literature the employment of two-dimensional materials instead of metals is relatively new and it is leading to silicon-based photodetectors with unprecedented performance in the infrared regime. This chapter aims, first to elucidate the physical effect and the working principles of these devices, then to describe the main structures reported in literature, finally to discuss the most significant results obtained in recent years.