scholarly journals Characterization of Impact Ionization Coefficient of ZnO Based on a p-Si/i-ZnO/n-AZO Avalanche Photodiode

Micromachines ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (8) ◽  
pp. 740
Author(s):  
Gaoming Li ◽  
Xiaolong Zhao ◽  
Xiangwei Jia ◽  
Shuangqing Li ◽  
Yongning He

The avalanche photodiode is a highly sensitive photon detector with wide applications in optical communication and single photon detection. ZnO is a promising wide band gap material to realize a UV avalanche photodiode (APD). However, the lack of p-type doping, the strong self-compensation effect, and the scarcity of data on the ionization coefficients restrain the development and application of ZnO APD. Furthermore, ZnO APD has been seldom reported before. In this work, we employed a p-Si/i-ZnO/n-AZO structure to successfully realize electron avalanche multiplication. Based on this structure, we investigated the band structure, field profile, Current–Voltage (I-V) characteristics, and avalanche gain. To examine the influence of the width of the i-ZnO layer on the performance, we changed the i-ZnO layer thickness to 250, 500, and 750 nm. The measured breakdown voltages agree well with the corresponding threshold electric field strengths that we calculated. The agreement between the experimental data and calculated results supports our analysis. Finally, we provide data on the impact ionization coefficients of electrons for ZnO along the (001) direction, which is of great significance in designing high-performance low excess noise ZnO APD. Our work lays a foundation to realize a high-performance ZnO-based avalanche device.

2020 ◽  
Vol 92 (1) ◽  
pp. 10301
Author(s):  
Tat Lung Wesley Ooi ◽  
Pei Ling Cheang ◽  
Ah Heng You ◽  
Yee Kit Chan

In this work, Monte Carlo model is developed to investigate the avalanche characteristics of GaN and Al0.45Ga0.55N avalanche photodiodes (APDs) using random ionization path lengths incorporating dead space effect. The simulation includes the impact ionization coefficients, multiplication gain and excess noise factor for electron- and hole-initiated multiplication with a range of thin multiplication widths. The impact ionization coefficient for GaN is higher than that of Al0.45Ga0.55N. For GaN, electron dominates the impact ionization at high electric field while hole dominate at low electric field whereas Al0.45Ga0.55N has hole dominate the impact ionization at higher field while electron dominate the lower field. In GaN APDs, electron-initiated multiplication is leading the multiplication gain at thinner multiplication widths while hole-initiated multiplication leads for longer widths. However for Al0.45Ga0.55N APDs, hole-initiated multiplication leads the multiplication gain for all multiplication widths simulated. The excess noise of electron-initiated multiplication in GaN APDs increases as multiplication widths increases while the excess noise decreases as the multiplication widths increases for hole-initiated multiplication. As for Al0.45Ga0.55N APDs, the excess noise for hole-initiated multiplication increases when multiplication width increases while the electron-initiated multiplication increases with the same gradient at all multiplication widths.


1993 ◽  
Vol 297 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiao Lihong ◽  
Meng Zhiguo ◽  
Sun Zhonglin

Because of the lower density of interface states in a-Si:H/a-SiN:H than that in a-Si:H/a-SiC:H, an a-Si:H/a-SiN multilayer reach-through avalanche photodiode is fabricated on an ITO/glass substrate by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) . In order to improve the performance of the a-Si:H/a-SiN:H APD'S, a novel structure is used. By controlling the deposition ratio of silicon and nitrogen of amorphous SiN,the valence band top of a-Si:H is deeper than that of a-SiN:H, that is, the a-Si :H/a-SiN: H system has the electron potential well in a-Si:H, while the hole well is in a-SiN:H, thus we can successfully suppress the hole impact ionization, correspondingly enhance the electron impact ionization effectively.The measurement of current versus voltage is employed to study the multiplication factors and the impact ionization coefficients. The characteristics of a-Si:H/a-SiN:H APD's,such as I-V curves, optical gains, impact ionization rates, excess noise factors, the relative response and the relationship between the breakdown voltage and wavelength, are studied. The electron multiplication factor is Mc=4.5 at reverse bias V=12v. An optical gain of 3.7 at reverse bias VR=12v and an incident light power Pin=3μw is obtained. Homo junction a-Si:H reach-through APD's and homojunction a-Si:H APD's are also fabricated for comparison.The results show that the novel a-Si:H/a-SiN:H APD's is promising in high-gain, low-noise photodetectors.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jun Yin ◽  
Lian Liu ◽  
Yashu Zang ◽  
Anni Ying ◽  
Wenjie Hui ◽  
...  

AbstractHere, an engineered tunneling layer enhanced photocurrent multiplication through the impact ionization effect was proposed and experimentally demonstrated on the graphene/silicon heterojunction photodetectors. With considering the suitable band structure of the insulation material and their special defect states, an atomic layer deposition (ALD) prepared wide-bandgap insulating (WBI) layer of AlN was introduced into the interface of graphene/silicon heterojunction. The promoted tunneling process from this designed structure demonstrated that can effectively help the impact ionization with photogain not only for the regular minority carriers from silicon, but also for the novel hot carries from graphene. As a result, significantly enhanced photocurrent as well as simultaneously decreased dark current about one order were accomplished in this graphene/insulation/silicon (GIS) heterojunction devices with the optimized AlN thickness of ~15 nm compared to the conventional graphene/silicon (GS) devices. Specifically, at the reverse bias of −10 V, a 3.96-A W−1 responsivity with the photogain of ~5.8 for the peak response under 850-nm light illumination, and a 1.03-A W−1 responsivity with ∼3.5 photogain under the 365 nm ultraviolet (UV) illumination were realized, which are even remarkably higher than those in GIS devices with either Al2O3 or the commonly employed SiO2 insulation layers. This work demonstrates a universal strategy to fabricate broadband, low-cost and high-performance photo-detecting devices towards the graphene-silicon optoelectronic integration.


2009 ◽  
Vol 615-617 ◽  
pp. 311-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
W.S. Loh ◽  
J.P.R. David ◽  
B.K. Ng ◽  
Stanislav I. Soloviev ◽  
Peter M. Sandvik ◽  
...  

Hole initiated multiplication characteristics of 4H-SiC Separate Absorption and Multiplication Avalanche Photodiodes (SAM-APDs) with a n- multiplication layer of 2.7 µm were obtained using 325nm excitation at temperatures ranging from 300 to 450K. The breakdown voltages increased by 200mV/K over the investigated temperature range, which indicates a positive temperature coefficient. Local ionization coefficients, including the extracted temperature dependencies, were derived in the form of the Chynoweth expression and were used to predict the hole multiplication characteristics at different temperatures. Good agreement was obtained between the measured and the modeled multiplication using these ionization coefficients. The impact ionization coefficients decreased with increasing temperature, corresponding to an increase in breakdown voltage. This result agrees well with the multiplication characteristics and can be attributed to phonon scattering enhanced carrier cooling which has suppressed the ionization process at high temperatures. Hence, a much higher electric field is required to achieve the same ionization rates.


2007 ◽  
Vol 556-557 ◽  
pp. 339-342 ◽  
Author(s):  
W.S. Loh ◽  
C. Mark Johnson ◽  
J.S. Ng ◽  
Peter M. Sandvik ◽  
Steve Arthur ◽  
...  

Hole initiated avalanche multiplication characteristics of 4H-SiC avalanche photodiodes have been studied. The diodes had n+-n-p SiC epitaxial layers grown on a p-type substrate. These 1 mm2 devices had very low dark currents and exhibited sharp breakdown at voltages of approximately 500V. The diodes multiplication characteristics appeared to be identical when the wavelength of the illuminating light from the top varied from 288 to 325nm, implying that almost pure hole initiated multiplication was occurring. The multiplication factor data were modelled using a local multiplication model with impact ionization coefficients of 4H-SiC reported by various authors. The impact ionization coefficients extracted from submicron devices by Ng et al. were found to give accurate predictions for multiplication factors within the uncertainties of the doping levels. This result suggests that their ionization coefficients can be applied to thicker bulk 4H-SiC structures.


2008 ◽  
Vol 93 (18) ◽  
pp. 183511 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. S. Carroll ◽  
K. Childs ◽  
R. Jarecki ◽  
T. Bauer ◽  
K. Saiz

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