AVS 59th Annual International Symposium and Exhibition
    Electronic Materials and Processing Friday Sessions
       Session EM+NS-FrM

Paper EM+NS-FrM5
Signatures of Interface Band Structure and Parallel Momentum Conservation of Hot Electrons across Metal-Semiconductor Schottky Diodes

Friday, November 2, 2012, 9:40 am, Room 14

Session: Low-Resistance Contacts to Nanoelectronics
Presenter: V.P. LaBella, University at Albany-SUNY
Authors: J. Garramone, Northwestern University
J. Abel, University at Albany-SUNY
R. Balsano, University at Albany-SUNY
S. Barraza-Lopez, University of Arkansas at Fayetteville
V.P. LaBella, University at Albany-SUNY
Correspondent: Click to Email
Understanding hot electron transport and scattering through meterials and interfaces is important for conventional integrated circuit technologies and futuristic applications such as hot carrier photovoltaics and hydrogen sensing. In this presentation, the hot electron attenuation length of Ag is measured utilizing ballistic electron emission microscopy (BEEM) on nanoscale Schottky diodes for Si(001) and Si(111) substrates. Marked differences in the attenuation length are observed at biases near the Schottky barrier depending upon the substrate orientation, increasing by an order of magnitude only for Si(001), while remaining unchanged for Si(111). These results provide clear evidence that the crystallographic orientation of the semiconductor substrate and parallel momentum conservation affect the hot electron transport across these interfaces. A theoretical model reproduces the effect that combines a free-electron description within the metal with an ab-initio description of the electronic structure of the semiconductor.