ELECTRON INTERFACE PHONON-SCATTERING IN GAAS GA1-XALXAS QUANTUM-WELL STRUCTURES WITH INTERFACE ROUGHNESS/

Considering the influence of interface roughness on phonon vibrational modes in the dielectric continuum model, electron-interface phonon sc attering rates are calculated in a model GaAs/Ga1-xAlxAs quantum-well structure. The intrasubband and intersubband scattering rates are give n as a function of quantum-well width. It is shown that interface phon on scattering is the dominant scattering mechanism in narrow quantum-w ell structures and electron relaxation is strongly dependent on interf ace roughness. For intersubband scattering, the infinite barrier heigh t approximation can introduce a large error, in particular, in narrow quantum-well structures. Our results are in good agreement with recent experimental data.