Single-electron capacitance spectroscopy of semiconductor microstructures

Abstract

We present a technique which permits a quantitative spectroscopy of discrete quantum levels in semiconductor microstructures. The method involves monitoring the capacitance signal resulting from single-electron tunneling. In a microscopic capacitor fabricated in GaAs we study the confined states of a single 1 μm disk to which electrons can tunnel from a nearby metallic layer. Charge transfer occurs only for bias voltages at which a quantum level is resonant with the Fermi energy of the metallic layer. This creates a sequence of distinct capacitance peaks whose bias positions can be directly converted to an energy scale to determine the electronic spectrum of the confined structure. The evolution of the spectrum in magnetic fields allows deduction of the nature of the bound states.