THE EFFECTS OF QUANTUM CONFINEMENT ON THE BINDING ENERGY OF HYDROGENIC IMPURITIES IN A SPHERICAL QUANTUM DOT

Abstract

The binding energy of a shallow hydrogenic impurity of a spherical quantum dot confined by harmonic oscillator-like and by rectangular well-like potentials, using a variational procedure within the effective mass approximation, has been determined. The calculations of the binding energy of the donor impurity as a function of the system geometry, and the donor impurity position have been investigated. The binding energy of shallow donor impurity depends not only on the quantum confinements but also on the impurity position. Our results reveal that (i) the donor binding energy decreases as the dot size increases irrespective of the impurity position, and (ii) the binding energy values of rectangular confinement are larger than the values of parabolic confinement and (iii) the rectangular confinement is better than the parabolic confinement in a spherical quantum dot.