Chapter 2 The Voltage–Current Characteristic of Metal–Semiconductor Contacts

Publisher Summary This chapter reviews the progress made since 1962 in the understanding of the voltage–current ( V–I) characteristic of Schottky barriers. Theories pertaining to ideal Schottky barriers are given and suggested that the V–I characteristic of a metal semiconductor contact is given by the diode theory. In practice, such a barrier is hard to attain and difficulties such as nonuniformity of the barrier height, or the charge density, or the existence of an interface layer between the metal and semiconductor will alter markedly the V–I characteristic. It is reported that the situation of the state of understanding of the V–I characteristic of Schottky barriers depends on the semiconductor carrier concentration considered. In this chapter emphasis is given to results obtained in the case of barriers made on III–V semiconductor compounds. It is quite evident that most of the results described in this chapter are not particular to III–V compounds and can be applied to other semiconductors.