Optoelectronic properties of zinc blende and wurtzite structured binary solids

Abstract

In this paper, we studied zinc blende (ZB) and wurtzite (Wu) type structured binary solids with conduction electrons and calculated the optoelectronic properties such as high frequency refractive index (n), optical susceptibility (χ), electronic polarizability (αe) and crystal ionicity (fi) using the plasma oscillation theory of solids formalism already employed for ternary chalcopyrite semiconductors. The present method is not limited to tetrahedrally coordinated semiconductors and ternary chalcopyrites, but can be used for all semiconducting compounds. We have applied extended formulae on zinc blende (ZB) and wurtzite (Wu) type structured binary semiconductors and found better agreement with the experimental data as compared to the values evaluated by previous researchers. The high frequency refractive index (n), optical susceptibility (χ), electronic polarizability (αe) and crystal ionicity (fi) of zinc blende (ZB) and wurtzite (Wu) type structure compounds exhibit a linear relationship when plotted on a log–log scale as against the plasmon energy N›ωp (in eV), which lies on a straight line. The results for high frequency refractive index differ from experimental values by the following amounts: ZnS (0%), ZnSe (0%), ZnTe (11%), CdS (11%), CdSe (15%), CdTe (20%), HgSe (5%), BN (20%), AlN (16%), AlP (15%), AlAs (0%), AlSb (13%), GaN (18%), GaP (27%), GaAs (8%), GaSb (7%), InN (8%), InP (5%), InAs (0.3%) and InSb (0.9%); and the results for optical susceptibility differ from experimental values by the following amounts: ZnS (10%), ZnSe (2%), ZnTe (8%), CdS (25%), CdSe (17%), CdTe (7%), AlAs (4.8%), AlSb (16%), GaP (1.6%), GaAs (9.8%), GaSb (22.7%), InP (12.8%), InAs (9%) and InSb (20%) in the present study. Key words: A. semiconductors, D. electronic properties, D. optical properties