Carrier depletion by defects levels in relaxed In0.2Ga0.8As/GaAs quantum-well Schottky diodes

Abstract

An increase in leakage current accompanied by a drastic carrier depletion is found for InGaAs/GaAs Schottky diodes when the InGaAs thickness is larger than its critical thickness. Due to drastic carrier depletion, free-carrier concentration around the InGaAs region for relaxed samples cannot be obtained from capacitance-voltage data but from resistance-capacitance time constant effect observed in capacitance-frequency measurement. A trap at 0.33 to 0.49 eV is observed for relaxed samples by deep-level transient spectroscopy. The resistance caused by carrier depletion has an activation energy close to that of the trap, supporting that the carrier depletion is caused by capture from the trap. (C) 2000 American Institute of Physics. [S0021-8979(00)00603-4].