方茹辉144145B20.doc

CHAPTER 4 Carrier Transport and Excess CarrIer Phenomena The drift velocity versus electric field characteristic of gallium arsenide is more complicated than for silicon or germanium. At low fields, the slope of the drift velocity versus -field is constant and is thc low-field electron mobility, which b approximately 8500 for gallium arsenide. The low-field electron mobility in gallium arsenide is much larger than in silicon. As the field increases, the electron drift velocity in gallium arsenide reaches a peak and then decreases. A differential mobility is the slope of the versus -field at a particular point on the curve and the negative slope of the drift velocity versus electric field represents a negative differ- ential mobility. The negative differential mobility produces a negative differential resistance; this characteristic is used in the design of oscillators. Negative differential The negative differential mobility can be understood by considering the E versus Mobility diagram for gallium arsenide, which is shown again in Figure 4.8. The density of States effective mass of the electron in the lower valley is The small effective mass leads to a large mobility. As the -field increases, the energy of the electron increases and the electron can be scattered into the upper valley, where tbe density of states effective mass is . The larger effective mass in the upper valley yields a smaller mobility. This intervalley transfer mechanism results ln a de- creasing average drift velocity of electrons with electric field, or the negative differ- ential mobility characteristic. Figure 4.8 | Energy-band structure for gallium arsenide showing the upper valley and lower valley in the conduction band. (From Sze [15]) TYU4.1 A drift current density of is required in a sendconductor device using n-type silicon with an applied electric field of = 25V/cm. Determine the impurity doping concentration that will achieve this specification. (Ans.