Modeling of electron tunneling through a tilted potential barrier

Abstract

Tunnel junctions are interesting for both studying fundamental physical phenomena and providing new technological applications. Modeling of the tunneling current is important for understanding the tunneling processes and interpreting experimental data. In this work, the tunneling current is modeled using the Tsu-Esaki formulation with numerically calculated transmission. The feasibility of analytical formulae used for fitting experimental results is studied by comparing them with this model. The Tsu-Esaki method with numerically calculated transmission provides the possibility to calculate tunneling currents and fit experimental I–V curves for wide bias voltage and barrier width ranges as opposed to the more restricted analytical formulae. I–V curve features typical of tilted barrier structures are further analyzed to provide insight into the question, which of the phenomena can be explained with this simple barrier model. In particular, a small change in the effective barrier width is suggested as a possible explanation for experimental I–V curve features previously interpreted by a change in the tilt and height of the barrier.