Hot-hole transport and noise phenomena in silicon at cryogenic temperatures from first principles

Abstract

The transport properties of hot holes in silicon at cryogenic temperatures exhibit several anomalous features, including the emergence of two distinct saturated drift velocity regimes and a nonmonotonic trend of the current noise versus electric field at microwave frequencies. Despite prior investigations, these features lack generally accepted explanations. Here, we examine the microscopic origin of these phenomena by extending a recently developed ab initio theory of high-field transport and noise in semiconductors. We find that the drift velocity anomaly may be attributed to scattering dominated by acoustic phonon emission, leading to an additional regime of drift velocity saturation at temperatures ∼40 K for which the acoustic phonon occupation is negligible; while the nonmonotonic trend in the current noise arises due to the decrease in momentum relaxation time with electric field. The former conclusion is consistent with the findings of prior work, but the latter distinctly differs from previous explanations. This work highlights the use of high-field transport and noise phenomena as sensitive probes of microscopic charge transport phenomena in semiconductors.

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