Investigating the Role of Band Offset on the Property and Operation of the Potential Well Barrier Diodes

Abstract

The impact of grading the GaAs/AlGaAs interface on carrier dynamics in a potential well barrier (PWB) diode has been explored and demonstrated in this paper. Three heterostructures in the GaAs/AlGaAs system namely GaAs/Al0.2Ga0.8As, GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As, and GaAs/Al0.4Ga0.6As with corresponding band offsets of 0.10, 0.25, and 0.30 eV, respectively, are investigated using the drift‐diffusion (DD) and Monte Carlo (MC) models. The behavior of the diodes with different band offsets are compared in terms of mean electron velocity, mean electron energy, and density of charge along the intrinsic regions and in the potential well. The MC simulation model enables the effects of space‐charge injection and carrier heating, which are not included in previous study of these structures, be treated quantitatively. Significant differences exist in the behavior of the three heterojunctions as this impacts the curvature coefficient and ideality factor of the diode. Both the ideality factor and curvature coefficient reflect the magnitude of band offset of the heterojunctions (interface).

Hot electron effects on the operation of potential well barrier diodes

“…Due to the similarity in the principle of operation of a PWB and PDB diodes and also, because it was found that considering hot electron effects was important in these devices at very high electric fields [7][8][9] , it becomes imperative to consider hot electron effects in the PWB diode. Previous papers have investigated the operation of potential well barrier diode using drift-diffusion models [5,10,11] , with the MC model treated in Ref. [12] though, no energy transport or heating effects were considered.…”

Improvement on Well Design and Operation of Potential Well Barrier Diodes

“…Just like Planar Doped Barrier diodes (PDB) [1], [2] and other heterostructure barrier devices, Potential Well Barrier diodes (PWB) studied in [3][4][5][6] have shown prospects of applications in detector and mixers. The diode has a lot of advantages compared to similar devices for the same purpose.…”