Theory of Transport Properties of Semiconductor Nanostructures


Book Description

Recent advances in the fabrication of semiconductors have created almost un limited possibilities to design structures on a nanometre scale with extraordinary electronic and optoelectronic properties. The theoretical understanding of elec trical transport in such nanostructures is of utmost importance for future device applications. This represents a challenging issue of today's basic research since it requires advanced theoretical techniques to cope with the quantum limit of charge transport, ultrafast carrier dynamics and strongly nonlinear high-field ef fects. This book, which appears in the electronic materials series, presents an over view of the theoretical background and recent developments in the theory of electrical transport in semiconductor nanostructures. It contains 11 chapters which are written by experts in their fields. Starting with a tutorial introduction to the subject in Chapter 1, it proceeds to present different approaches to transport theory. The semiclassical Boltzmann transport equation is in the centre of the next three chapters. Hydrodynamic moment equations (Chapter 2), Monte Carlo techniques (Chapter 3) and the cellular au tomaton approach (Chapter 4) are introduced and illustrated with applications to nanometre structures and device simulation. A full quantum-transport theory covering the Kubo formalism and nonequilibrium Green's functions (Chapter 5) as well as the density matrix theory (Chapter 6) is then presented.




Theory of Semiconductor Quantum Devices


Book Description

Primary goal of this book is to provide a cohesive description of the vast field of semiconductor quantum devices, with special emphasis on basic quantum-mechanical phenomena governing the electro-optical response of new-generation nanomaterials. The book will cover within a common language different types of optoelectronic nanodevices, including quantum-cascade laser sources and detectors, few-electron/exciton quantum devices, and semiconductor-based quantum logic gates. The distinguishing feature of the present volume is a unified microscopic treatment of quantum-transport and coherent-optics phenomena on ultrasmall space- and time-scales, as well as of their semiclassical counterparts.




Introduction to Semiconductor Device Modelling


Book Description

This book deals mainly with physical device models which are developed from the carrier transport physics and device geometry considerations. The text concentrates on silicon and gallium arsenide devices and includes models of silicon bipolar junction transistors, junction field effect transistors (JFETs), MESFETs, silicon and GaAs MESFETs, transferred electron devices, pn junction diodes and Schottky varactor diodes. The modelling techniques of more recent devices such as the heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBT) and the high electron mobility transistors are discussed. This book contains details of models for both equilibrium and non-equilibrium transport conditions. The modelling Technique of Small-scale devices is discussed and techniques applicable to submicron-dimensioned devices are included. A section on modern quantum transport analysis techniques is included. Details of essential numerical schemes are given and a variety of device models are used to illustrate the application of these techniques in various fields.




Computational Electronics


Book Description

Starting with the simplest semiclassical approaches and ending with the description of complex fully quantum-mechanical methods for quantum transport analysis of state-of-the-art devices, Computational Electronics: Semiclassical and Quantum Device Modeling and Simulation provides a comprehensive overview of the essential techniques and methods for effectively analyzing transport in semiconductor devices. With the transistor reaching its limits and new device designs and paradigms of operation being explored, this timely resource delivers the simulation methods needed to properly model state-of-the-art nanoscale devices. The first part examines semiclassical transport methods, including drift-diffusion, hydrodynamic, and Monte Carlo methods for solving the Boltzmann transport equation. Details regarding numerical implementation and sample codes are provided as templates for sophisticated simulation software. The second part introduces the density gradient method, quantum hydrodynamics, and the concept of effective potentials used to account for quantum-mechanical space quantization effects in particle-based simulators. Highlighting the need for quantum transport approaches, it describes various quantum effects that appear in current and future devices being mass-produced or fabricated as a proof of concept. In this context, it introduces the concept of effective potential used to approximately include quantum-mechanical space-quantization effects within the semiclassical particle-based device simulation scheme. Addressing the practical aspects of computational electronics, this authoritative resource concludes by addressing some of the open questions related to quantum transport not covered in most books. Complete with self-study problems and numerous examples throughout, this book supplies readers with the practical understanding required to create their own simulators.




Theory of Electron Transport in Semiconductors


Book Description

This book originated out of a desire to provide students with an instrument which might lead them from knowledge of elementary classical and quantum physics to moderntheoreticaltechniques for the analysisof electrontransport in semiconductors. The book is basically a textbook for students of physics, material science, and electronics. Rather than a monograph on detailed advanced research in a speci?c area, it intends to introduce the reader to the fascinating ?eld of electron dynamics in semiconductors, a ?eld that, through its applications to electronics, greatly contributed to the transformationof all our lives in the second half of the twentieth century, and continues to provide surprises and new challenges. The ?eld is so extensive that it has been necessary to leave aside many subjects, while others could be dealt with only in terms of their basic principles. The book is divided into ?ve major parts. Part I moves from a survey of the fundamentals of classical and quantum physics to a brief review of basic semiconductor physics. Its purpose is to establish a common platform of language and symbols, and to make the entire treatment, as far as pos- ble, self-contained. Parts II and III, respectively, develop transport theory in bulk semiconductors in semiclassical and quantum frames. Part IV is devoted to semiconductor structures, including devices and mesoscopic coherent s- tems. Finally, Part V develops the basic theoretical tools of transport theory within the modern nonequilibrium Green-function formulation, starting from an introduction to second-quantization formalism.




Atomistic Simulation Of Quantum Transport In Nanoelectronic Devices (With Cd-rom)


Book Description

Computational nanoelectronics is an emerging multi-disciplinary field covering condensed matter physics, applied mathematics, computer science, and electronic engineering. In recent decades, a few state-of-the-art software packages have been developed to carry out first-principle atomistic device simulations. Nevertheless those packages are either black boxes (commercial codes) or accessible only to very limited users (private research codes). The purpose of this book is to open one of the commercial black boxes, and to demonstrate the complete procedure from theoretical derivation, to numerical implementation, all the way to device simulation. Meanwhile the affiliated source code constitutes an open platform for new researchers. This is the first book of its kind. We hope the book will make a modest contribution to the field of computational nanoelectronics.




Theory of Transport Properties of Semiconductor Nanostructures


Book Description

Recent advances in the fabrication of semiconductors have created almost un limited possibilities to design structures on a nanometre scale with extraordinary electronic and optoelectronic properties. The theoretical understanding of elec trical transport in such nanostructures is of utmost importance for future device applications. This represents a challenging issue of today's basic research since it requires advanced theoretical techniques to cope with the quantum limit of charge transport, ultrafast carrier dynamics and strongly nonlinear high-field ef fects. This book, which appears in the electronic materials series, presents an over view of the theoretical background and recent developments in the theory of electrical transport in semiconductor nanostructures. It contains 11 chapters which are written by experts in their fields. Starting with a tutorial introduction to the subject in Chapter 1, it proceeds to present different approaches to transport theory. The semiclassical Boltzmann transport equation is in the centre of the next three chapters. Hydrodynamic moment equations (Chapter 2), Monte Carlo techniques (Chapter 3) and the cellular au tomaton approach (Chapter 4) are introduced and illustrated with applications to nanometre structures and device simulation. A full quantum-transport theory covering the Kubo formalism and nonequilibrium Green's functions (Chapter 5) as well as the density matrix theory (Chapter 6) is then presented.




Theory of Quantum Transport at Nanoscale


Book Description

This book is an introduction to a rapidly developing field of modern theoretical physics – the theory of quantum transport at nanoscale. The theoretical methods considered in the book are in the basis of our understanding of charge, spin and heat transport in nanostructures and nanostructured materials and are widely used in nanoelectronics, molecular electronics, spin-dependent electronics (spintronics) and bio-electronics. The book is based on lectures for graduate and post-graduate students at the University of Regensburg and the Technische Universität Dresden (TU Dresden). The first part is devoted to the basic concepts of quantum transport: Landauer-Büttiker method and matrix Green function formalism for coherent transport, Tunneling (Transfer) Hamiltonian and master equation methods for tunneling, Coulomb blockade, vibrons and polarons. The results in this part are obtained as possible without sophisticated techniques, such as nonequilibrium Green functions, which are considered in detail in the second part. A general introduction into the nonequilibrium Green function theory is given. The approach based on the equation-of-motion technique, as well as more sophisticated one based on the Dyson-Keldysh diagrammatic technique are presented. The main attention is paid to the theoretical methods able to describe the nonequilibrium (at finite voltage) electron transport through interacting nanosystems, specifically the correlation effects due to electron-electron and electron-vibron interactions.




Quantum Transport in Semiconductors


Book Description

The majority of the chapters in this volume represent a series of lectures. that were given at a workshop on quantum transport in ultrasmall electron devices, held at San Miniato, Italy, in March 1987. These have, of course, been extended and updated during the period that has elapsed since the workshop was held, and have been supplemented with additional chapters devoted to the tunneling process in semiconductor quantum-well structures. The aim of this work is to review and present the current understanding in nonequilibrium quantum transport appropriate to semiconductors. Gen erally, the field of interest can be categorized as that appropriate to inhomogeneous transport in strong applied fields. These fields are most likely to be strongly varying in both space and time. Most of the literature on quantum transport in semiconductors (or in metallic systems, for that matter) is restricted to the equilibrium approach, in which spectral densities are maintained as semiclassical energy conserving delta functions, or perhaps incorporating some form of collision broadening through a Lorentzian shape, and the distribution functions are kept in the equilibrium Fermi-Dirac form. The most familiar field of nonequilibrium transport, at least for the semiconductor world, is that of hot carriers in semiconductors.