We have fabricated single-, three- and five-layered Si/beta-FeSi2/Si (SFS) double heterostructures (DH) on Si (0 0 1) substrates by reactive deposition epitaxy (RDE) for beta-FeSi2 and by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) for Si. Time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) measurements revealed that the luminescence at 1.54 mu m was composed of fast (16 ns) and slow (150 ns) components at 8 K. These are thought to originate from beta-FeSi2 and the defect-related D1 line in Si, respectively. 1.6 mu m electroluminescence (EL) was obtained at room temperature (RT) from the five-layered SFS DH for current densities above 20 A/cm(2). (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.