H. Sakata et al., RESONANT-TUNNELING TRIANGULAR-BARRIER OPTOELECTRONIC SWITCH BY GAS-SOURCE MOLECULAR-BEAM EPITAXY, Journal of crystal growth, 150(1-4), 1995, pp. 1389-1394
We report a novel optical bistable device, resonant-tunneling triangul
ar-barrier optoelectronic switch (R-TOPS), which consists of a double-
barrier resonant-tunneling diode (DB-RTD) and a triangular-barrier pho
totransistor (TBP), grown by gas source molecular beam epitaxy (GSMBE)
. First, we studied the potential of the GSMBE to grow a DB-RTD and a
TBP. The DB-RTD with In0.53Ga0.47As(well)/AIAs(barrier) exhibited clea
r negative differential resistance (NDR). Interfaces between In0.53Ga0
.47As and AIAs in the DB-RTD were of good quality without dislocations
in spite of the strained AIAs layers. On the other hand, the TBP with
n(+)-i-delta p(+)-i-n(+) structure composed of In0.53Ga0.47As/In(0.52
)Al(0.48)AS layers was fabricated on InP, which was the first demonstr
ation of a TBP at 1 mu m wavelength range operation to our knowledge.
On these basis, we fabricated the R-TOPS devices. Sharp NDR with clear
bistability was successfully observed, and its characteristics were d
ependent on optical input power. Bistability was observed in the relat
ion between input-light power and output-current. By connecting the de
vice to a laser diode, clear optical bistability and sharp optical NDR
property with high contrast and at low input-light power were also de
monstrated. We found that both the TBP and the DB-RTD worked well in t
he R-TOPS grown by GSMBE.