Valence band structure of polytypic zinc-blende/wurtzite GaAs nanowires probed by polarization-dependent photoluminescence

We conducted temperature-dependent measurements of the photoluminescence (PL) polarization on GaAs nanowires (NWs) with polytypic zinc-blende/wurtzite structure in order to probe the symmetry and energy structure of the valence band in the wurtzite segments of the NWs. The low-temperature measurements revealed that in most of the investigated cases, the ground level of the interface excitons responsible for the PL is formed by the heavy hole. To describe the observed temperature dependence of the degree of PL polarization, we developed a theoretical model that allows an estimation of the splitting between the heavy hole and light hole exciton subbands in these NWs. This splitting is smaller than expected in pure wurtzite on the basis of recent first-principles calculations, which may be attributed to the multiple twinned nature of the wurtzite sections, which effectively behave as a polytype of lower hexagonality.