Separate Mott and liquid-gas transitions in a coulomb gas: Photoexcited germanium

Abstract The phase diagram of photoexcited electron-hole (e-h) pairs, which are confined to a strain well in stressed Ge, is investigated via measurements of energy spectra and spatial distributions of e-h recombination luminescence. Above a triple-point temperature of 3.7 ± 0.2K, a Mott (metal-insulator) transition is observed at lower densities than the liquid-gas (LG) transition. The measured critical temperatures of the Mott and LG transitions are 6.5 ± 0.5K and 4.5 ± 0.2K respectively.