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    Multiscale simulations of the electronic structure of III-nitride quantum wells with varied indium content: Connecting atomistic and continuum-based models
    (Melville, NY : American Inst. of Physics, 2021) Chaudhuri, D.; O’Donovan, M.; Streckenbach, T.; Marquardt, O.; Farrell, P.; Patra, S.K.; Koprucki, T.; Schulz, S.
    Carrier localization effects in III-N heterostructures are often studied in the frame of modified continuum-based models utilizing a single-band effective mass approximation. However, there exists no comparison between the results of a modified continuum model and atomistic calculations on the same underlying disordered energy landscape. We present a theoretical framework that establishes a connection between atomistic tight-binding theory and continuum-based electronic structure models, here a single-band effective mass approximation, and provide such a comparison for the electronic structure of (In,Ga)N quantum wells. In our approach, in principle, the effective masses are the only adjustable parameters since the confinement energy landscape is directly obtained from tight-binding theory. We find that the electronic structure calculated within effective mass approximation and the tight-binding model differ noticeably. However, at least in terms of energy eigenvalues, an improved agreement between the two methods can be achieved by adjusting the band offsets in the continuum model, enabling, therefore, a recipe for constructing a modified continuum model that gives a reasonable approximation of the tight-binding energies. Carrier localization characteristics for energetically low lying, strongly localized states differ, however, significantly from those obtained using the tight-binding model. For energetically higher lying, more delocalized states, good agreement may be achieved. Therefore, the atomistically motivated continuum-based single-band effective mass model established provides a good, computationally efficient alternative to fully atomistic investigations, at least at when targeting questions related to higher temperatures and carrier densities in (In,Ga)N systems.
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    From atomistic tight-binding theory to macroscale drift–diffusion: Multiscale modeling and numerical simulation of uni-polar charge transport in (In,Ga)N devices with random fluctuations
    (Melville, NY : American Inst. of Physics, 2021) O’Donovan, Michael; Chaudhuri, Debapriya; Streckenbach, Timo; Farrell, Patricio; Schulz, Stefan; Koprucki, Thomas
    Random alloy fluctuations significantly affect the electronic, optical, and transport properties of (In,Ga)N-based optoelectronic devices. Transport calculations accounting for alloy fluctuations currently use a combination of modified continuum-based models, which neglect to a large extent atomistic effects. In this work, we present a model that bridges the gap between atomistic theory and macroscopic transport models. To do so, we combine atomistic tight-binding theory and continuum-based drift–diffusion solvers, where quantum corrections are included via the localization landscape method. We outline the ingredients of this framework in detail and present first results for uni-polar electron transport in single and multi- (In,Ga)N quantum well systems. Overall, our results reveal that both random alloy fluctuations and quantum corrections significantly affect the current–voltage characteristics of uni-polar electron transport in such devices. However, our investigations indicate that the importance of quantum corrections and random alloy fluctuations can be different for single and multi-quantum well systems.