Chemical Vapor Deposition Growth of Ternary Cu₃PS₄ Nanowires for Polarization-Sensitive Photodetection

Low-dimensional ternary materials with low-symmetry structure have emerged as promising candidates for constructing polarization-sensitive photodetectors. However, the photodetection applications of ternary materials remain challenging due to the limited varieties and the uncontrollable preparation. Herein, ternary Cu₃PS₄ nanowires with tunable thickness are successfully synthesized via chemical vapor deposition method. The grown Cu₃PS₄ nanowires present excellent structural anisotropy and strong in-plane second-order nonlinear optical anisotropy, as evidenced by angle-resolved polarized Raman spectra and second harmonic generation measurements. Impressively, Cu₃PS₄-based photodetector demonstrates a responsivity of 8.8 mAW⁻¹, detectivity of 5.01 × 10⁹ Jones, and photoresponse speeds with rise (decay) time of 1.5 (3.5) ms. Interestingly, the photodetector achieves polarization-sensitivity photoresponse with an anisotropic ratio of 1.3 at 520 nm based on its inherent structural anisotropy and geometrical shapes. This work broadens the scope of synthesis strategy for various low-dimensional ternary metal chalcohalide semiconductors and provides great opportunities for designing high-performance and multifunctional optoelectronic devices.