Instability of the Electron-Hole Plasma in Silicon

Abstract

It is shown that the electron-phonon interaction in covalent semiconductors drives an instability in the electron-hole plasma at high temperature. The instability might be the reason for melting of tetrahedrally bound semiconductors. If this is true, the intrinsic carrier concentration of silicon at the melting temperature would be of the order of ${10}^{21}$ ${\mathrm{cm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$ instead of the commonly accepted value of 2\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}${10}^{19}$ ${\mathrm{cm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$.