Modeling Energy Bands in Type II Superlattices
1
Faculty of Exact Sciences, El-Oued University, P.O. Box 789, El-Oued 39000, Algeria
2
Faculty of Art, Science and Technology, The University of Northampton, Northampton NN2 6JD, UK
3
LMSE Laboratory, University of Biskra. B.P 145 R.P, Biskra 07000, Algeria
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
†
These authors contributed equally to this work.
Crystals 2019, 9(12), 629; https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst9120629
Received: 5 November 2019 / Revised: 23 November 2019 / Accepted: 25 November 2019 / Published: 28 November 2019
(This article belongs to the Section Inorganic Crystalline Materials)
We present a rigorous model for the overall band structure calculation using the perturbative k p approach for arbitrary layered cubic zincblende semiconductor nanostructures. This approach, first pioneered by Kohn and Luttinger, is faster than atomistic ab initio approaches and provides sufficiently accurate information for optoelectronic processes near high symmetry points in semiconductor crystals. k p Hamiltonians are discretized and diagonalized using a finite element method (FEM) with smoothed mesh near interface edges and different high order Lagrange/Hermite basis functions, hence enabling accurate determination of bound states and related quantities with a small number of elements. Such properties make the model more efficient than other numerical models that are usually used. Moreover, an energy-dependent effective mass non-parabolic model suitable for large gap materials is also included, which offers fast and reasonably accurate results without the need to solve the full multi-band Hamiltonian. Finally, the tools are validated on three semiconductor nanostructures: (1) the bound energies of a finite quantum well using the energy-dependent effective mass non-parabolic model; (2) the InAs bulk band structure; and (3) the electronic band structure for the absorber region of photodetectors based on a type-II InAs/GaSb superlattice at room temperature. The tools are shown to work on simple and sophisticated designs and the results show very good agreement with recently published experimental works.
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MDPI and ACS Style
Becer, Z.; Bennecer, A.; Sengouga, N. Modeling Energy Bands in Type II Superlattices. Crystals 2019, 9, 629. https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst9120629
AMA Style
Becer Z, Bennecer A, Sengouga N. Modeling Energy Bands in Type II Superlattices. Crystals. 2019; 9(12):629. https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst9120629
Chicago/Turabian StyleBecer, Zoubir; Bennecer, Abdeldjalil; Sengouga, Noureddine. 2019. "Modeling Energy Bands in Type II Superlattices" Crystals 9, no. 12: 629. https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst9120629
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