2026-05-25 東北大学
図1. 開発した酸化亜鉛材料の発光スペクトルと生体組織の透過像 （左）開発した酸化亜鉛は750 nmを中心波長とする近赤外域で発光します。この波長領域は、生体内を比較的透過しやすいことから、生体の窓Iと呼ばれています。（右）開発した酸化亜鉛を荷重によって発光させることで、生体組織の違いをコントラストとして捉える透過イメージングが可能であることが分かります。
＜関連情報＞
- https://www.tohoku.ac.jp/japanese/2026/05/press20260525-03-zno.html
- https://advanced.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/advs.75587
地球上に豊富に存在する酸化物半導体におけるストレスから光への変換 Stress-to-Light Conversion in an Earth-Abundant Oxide Semiconductor
Tomoki Uchiyama, Koki Otonari, Reona Omori, Guangfa Yang, Eiji Nishibori, Ying Chen, Xu-Guang Zheng, Chao-Nan Xu
Advanced Science Published: 08 May 2026
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1002/advs.75587
ABSTRACT
Stress-to-light conversion in solids represents a unique photonic functionality, yet it has never been realized in a chemically simple and sustainable material. Zinc oxide (ZnO) is an earth-abundant compound widely used in cosmetics, food supplements, paints, and medicinal products since prehistoric times. It is also a promising semiconductor for electronics and photonics owing to its high transparency, high electron mobility, and wide bandgap, more than three times that of silicon. Here, we show that the sustainable semiconductor ZnO exhibits strong near-infrared (NIR) luminescence under elastic stress when defect-engineered to stabilize a p-type state. This transformation overcomes the intrinsic n-type character of ZnO through the partial substitution of Zn2+ with Li+ or Na+, introducing deep-level defects that enable stress-driven NIR emission and ferroelectricity. These coupled electronic and structural effects reveal a previously unknown light-emitting function in a simple oxide lattice. Our findings establish a rare-earth-free, self-powered platform for NIR photonics, offering scalable opportunities for biophotonic signaling and infrastructure health monitoring.
