Temperature dependence of the impact ionization coefficients in GaAs, cubic SiC, and zinc-blende GaN.

In this article we discuss the effect of temperature on the impact ionization coefficients in wide band-gap semiconductors and compare it to that of bulk GaAs. The impact ionization coefficients as a function of temperature are examined for three semiconductors: gallium arsenide, cubic phase silicon carbide, and zinc-blende phase gallium nitride. It is found that the magnitude of the phonon energy is principally responsible for changes in the impact ionization coefficients as a result of temperature change. While the energy band gap of a material does have a temperature dependence that directly affects the impact ionization transition rate, that change is much smaller than the relative change in the magnitude of the phonon-scattering rates in all of the materials studied here. The phonon energies are found to play a vital role in the magnitude of the change in the scattering rates as a function of temperature. Materials with relatively small phonon energies have phonon scattering rates that change considerably with temperature, and therefore have impact ionization coefficients that also change considerably with changes in temperature. Conversely, the phonon scattering rate in materials with a large phonon energy is less affected and thus these materials have impact ionization coefficients that are relatively insensitive to changes in the temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]