QUANTUM-WELL STATES OF INAS ALSB RESONANT-TUNNELING DIODES

We study transmission resonances associated with the n = 1 quantum-wel l states of InAs/AlSb resonant-tunneling diodes using an empirical tig ht-binding model. We find that the transmission tends to be fairly sen sitive to the wave vector in the plane of the interface, indicating th at the usual expression for the tunneling current (which neglects this explicit dependence) is most likely not a good approximation. We show how this behavior is related to the E(k) relation for the InAs conduc tion band. Finally, we examine the envelope functions associated with the quasibound states, and discuss how their appearance relates to the orbitals of which they are composed.