Atomic-Scale Insights into Semiconductor Heterostructures: From Experimental Three-Dimensional Analysis of the Interface to a Generalized Theory of Interfacial Roughness Scattering
Thomas Grange, Samik Mukherjee, Giovanni Capellini, Michele Montanari, Luca Persichetti, L. Di Gaspare, Stefan Birner, Anis Attiaoui, Oussama Moutanabbir, Michele Virgilio, M. De Seta
Abstract
Relentless miniaturization has driven progress in semiconductor technology, but now, at the atomic scale, predictive descriptions of heterointerfaces (and even basic data on them) are still conspicuously absent. The authors combine atom-probe tomography with advanced modeling to study the roughness of real interfaces, and their influence on charge-carrier scattering in two-dimensional quantum confined systems. This yields a state-of-the art platform to simulate the optical gain in $e.g.$ a Si-Ge quantum cascade laser, allowing precise control of optoelectronic performance by elucidating key physical properties of heterointerfaces and their impact on device physics.