ELECTRON-ENERGY RELAXATION IN INFRARED HOT-ELECTRON TRANSISTORS

In hot-electron transistors and infrared hot-electron transistors, the energy distribution rho(E) of the injected electrons after Passing th rough the base can be directly measured at the collector. In this lett er a theoretical calculation on rho(E) is presented, taking optical ph onon emission and plasmon emission into account. We found that the rel ative contributions of these two mechanisms depend on the base doping density N-d. When N-d is less than 3.3 X 10(17) cm(-3), phonon emissio n dominates. For a larger N-d, plasmon emission becomes more important . We applied the calculation to devices with different N-d, and obtain ed quantitative agreement with the experiment. (C) 1996 American Insti tute of Physics.