Photon-assisted breakdown, negative resistance, and switching in a quantum-well transistor laser

Abstract

Data are presented on the transistor laser with collector bias and photon-assisted tunneling causing, under the constraints IE+IB+IC=0 (α=ΔIC∕ΔIE) and α→1, breakdown and negative resistance effects in the IC-VCE characteristics. Collector bias, aided by photon-assisted tunneling (Franz—Keldysh absorption), supplies holes to the n-p-n transistor base by tunneling escape of electrons (ΔIB=0), “feeding” quantum-well recombination radiation (generation and regeneration, ΔIE=ΔIC=ΔIhv) and yielding the negative resistance/switching condition α→1 (α=ΔIC∕ΔIE, ΔIC=ΔIE, ΔIB=0, IE+IB+IC=0), and, as a consequence, corners, negative resistance, switching, vertical collector current (ΔVCE≈0), spectral change, and mode hopping effects in the IC-VCE characteristics.