Comparative study on calculated terahertz absorption spectra of different heterostructure materials with external magnetic field

Abstract

Room temperature operation and frequency tunability are attractive advantages of terahertz (THz) detectors based on the two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) in the heterostructure material with external magnetic field. This work compared absorption spectra of four typical heterostructure materials (AlGaN/GaN, InAlN/GaN, AlGaAs/GaAs and SiGe/Si) with the nonlocal magnetoconductivity model at ambient and cryogenic temperatures in the frequency range 0–5 THz. The GaN based materials have the highest absorption amplitude, while the AlGaAs/GaAs material owns the largest frequency shift as the magnetic field increases up to 10 tesla, although superconducting magnets at cryogenic temperature are usually employed to provide that high magnetic field. The numerical results showed that the absorption properties (amplitude and frequency) could be further optimized by other parameters, such as the period and filling factor of the grating coupler, and the barrier thickness.