INFLUENCE OF CHARGE FLOW ALONG A SEMICONDUCTOR SURFACE ON THE NATURE OF THE MULTIPLICATION COEFFICIENT IN A SILICON-WIDE-GAP LAYER STRUCTURE

It has been shown that the how of mobile minority carriers along the s emiconductor-wide-gap layer interface substantially influences the uni formity of the multiplication coefficient in an avalanche photodetecto r. Around inhomogeneities in the semiconductor substrate, a ''dead zon e'' of fairly large area is formed, where the multiplication coefficie nt is several orders of magnitude lower than that on the remaining are a of the device. Specific methods are proposed to improve the uniformi ty of the avalanche process in a semiconductor-wide-gap layer structur e. (C) 1997 American Institute of Physics. [S1063-7850(97)02904-2].