CURRENT-VOLTAGE INSTABILITY IN FREESTANDING SEMICONDUCTOR QUANTUM WIRES

Dissipative electron transport in a free-standing semiconductor wire i s considered. Dependences of the drift velocity and electron temperatu re on the applied electric field are found. It is shown that the effec tive cooling of electrons which takes place at a certain region of the lattice temperature gives rise to an instability of the steady state, and to negative differential resistivity.