Nitrogen-doped gallium phosphide nanobelts

Nitrogen-doped gallium phosphide nanobelts were directly synthesized via a sublimation of ball-milled powders under ammonia flow. The average width of the nanobelts is 300 nm and the thickness is about 1/10 of the width. They consist of single-crystalline zinc blende structure crystal with the [111] direction parallel to the belt axis. Electron energy-loss spectroscopy reveals that the nitrogen doping occurs mainly in the surface region. Photoluminescence shows the typical isoelectronic bound exciton peaks in the range of 2.11–2.25 eV, suggesting a concentration of ∼1018 cm−3 nitrogen atoms.