Resonant Tunneling of Electrons and Holes through the AlGaAs/GaAsBi/AlGaAs Quantum Structure

Abstract

In this paper, we report a quantitative study of a resonant tunneling diode (RTD) based on the AlGaAs/GaAsBi/AlGaAs structure as an active part of the device. First, the physical parameters of the GaAsBi alloy (bandgap energy, effective masses), to be used as input data for the calculation of transmission tunneling through the diode, are determined using the band anticrossing (BAC) approach. Second, we have calculated the I-V characteristic of RTD in order to analyze its performance via the values of peak-to-valley current ratio (PVCR) and negative differential conductance (NDC). Our calculation takes into account the effect of two types of carriers (electrons and holes) on the transport properties of the system. Remarkably, high performance (PVCR~450) is reached by optimizing the metallurgic and physical parameters of the structure. It is demonstrating that the incorporation of Bi in the GaAs matrix favors transport by holes and enhances the performance of RTD compared with standard one using electron conduction.