Potential gradient along semiconductor-surface projections in an external electric field

Progress in Experimental Measurements of the Surface–Surface Casimir Force: Electrostatic Calibrations and Limitations to Accuracy

“…Our initial guess was that there was a distance offset in our calibrations due to penetration into the plates of the calibration electric field. The problem is that a quasi-static electric field can propagate a finite distance into a semiconductor (see, e.g., [45]); this distance is determined by the combined consideration of diffusion and field driven electric currents, leading to an effective field penetration length (Debye-Hückel length)…”

“…If V −V s is large compared to k b T , the effective penetration depth increases because the charge density is modified in the vicinity of the surface. The potential in the plates is no longer a simple exponential, however one can define an effective shielding length [45]…”