Probing Capacitive Coupling and Collective Transport in PbSe Quantum-Dot Arrays Using Scanning Tunneling Spectroscopy

Abstract

Semiconductor quantum dots with diameters of several to tens of nanometers have been largely synthesized through colloidal techniques for nanoscience exploration of quantum confinement, Coulomb staircase, and artificial-atom states in individual quantum dots and self-assembling growth behavior. Although charge transport of three-dimensional quantum dot arrays has been attempted for study on the micron scale, the electrical properties of a nanoscale array, self-assembled from a single quantum dot through a bottom-up procedure, have not been explored yet. We control growth parameters to self-assemble different sizes of PbSe quantum-dot arrays on flat gold surface for scanning tunneling spectroscopy measurements. The current-voltage curves of the arrays are analyzed using a double-barrier tunnel junction model to acquire the shunt capacitance between the array and the gold substrate. The increment of this capacitance is small as the particle number increases extremely from 1 to 40. Thus the array cannot be taken as a simple semiconductor island. We apply collective transport theory to exploration of electron tunneling and capacitive coupling between PbSe quantum dots in the array.