Temperature dependent mobility in single-crystal and chemical vapor-deposited diamond

The combined electron and hole mobility of a single‐crystal type IIa natural diamond and a polycrystalline diamond film deposited by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) were measured using transient photoconductivity as a function of excitation density (1013–1017 cm−3) and temperature (120–410 K). In natural diamond the temperature dependence suggests that the mobility is limited by phonon scattering at low free carrier densities, and by electron‐hole scattering at high densities. The combined electron and hole phonon‐limited mobility at room temperature is 3000 (±500) cm2/V s. In the CVD film, the mobility at room temperature was estimated to be 50 cm2/V s at low excitation densities. The temperature dependence of the mobility‐lifetime product at low excitation densities is different from that of natural diamond, and suggests that charged center scattering, rather than acoustic phonon scattering, is the dominant effect. High densities of nitrogen and dislocations are known to be present in the natural diamon...