1. Analysis of the dependence of critical electric field on semiconductor bandgap
- Author
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Oleksiy Slobodyan, Jack Flicker, Jeramy Dickerson, Jonah Shoemaker, Andrew Binder, Trevor Smith, Stephen Goodnick, Robert Kaplar, and Mark Hollis
- Subjects
Mechanics of Materials ,Mechanical Engineering ,General Materials Science ,Condensed Matter Physics - Abstract
Understanding of semiconductor breakdown under high electric fields is an important aspect of materials’ properties, particularly for the design of power devices. For decades, a power-law has been used to describe the dependence of material-specific critical electrical field ($${\mathcal{E}}_{\text{crit}}$$ E crit ) at which the material breaks down and bandgap (Eg). The relationship is often used to gauge tradeoffs of emerging materials whose properties haven’t yet been determined. Unfortunately, the reported dependencies of $${\mathcal{E}}_{\text{crit}}$$ E crit on Eg cover a surprisingly wide range in the literature. Moreover, $${\mathcal{E}}_{\text{crit}}$$ E crit is a function of material doping. Further, discrepancies arise in $${\mathcal{E}}_{\text{crit}}$$ E crit values owing to differences between punch-through and non-punch-through device structures. We report a new normalization procedure that enables comparison of critical electric field values across materials, doping, and different device types. An extensive examination of numerous references reveals that the dependence $${\mathcal{E}}_{\text{crit}}$$ E crit ∝ Eg1.83 best fits the most reliable and newest data for both direct and indirect semiconductors. Graphical abstract more...
- Published
- 2022
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