Abstract
In recent years, research groups have used metal-metal point contact diodes for frequency mixing and detection of infrared laser radiation. It has been postulated that the mechanism for the nonlinear current-voltage characteristic of the diode is the tunneling of electrons through an intermediate oxide film from the whisker tip to the metal base, i.e., the configuration is considered to be a metal-oxide-metal (MOM) tunneling junction. Several features of the diodes' operation create considerable doubt concerning the applicability of the MOM tunneling mechanism. Analysis of the available data led us to postulate an alternate solid state mechanism, namely a thermally enhanced field emission process. Such emission would be a consequence of the immersion of the whisker in the laser radiation resulting in (1) conduction heating which induces thermionic emission and (2) generation of an electric field at the tip necessary for electron tunneling. In an earlier paper, we calculated the power absorbed by the cylindrical shank of a point contact diode in an infrared radiation field. Using the absorbed power as a source, detailed calculations were made of the laser induced temperature distributions on the diode; more approximate treatments were used to obtain the electric fields developed on the tip. Values of the computed temperature and field parameters for tungsten were found to be consistent with a thermal field emission process. In this paper we present a more rigorous calculation of the voltages and fields induced on different metal whisker tips by the incident laser radiation. Linear antenna theory is used to describe the receiving properties of the diode. The actual pointed geometry of the diode tip has been taken into account using Schelkunoff's theory of the conical antenna. The electric fields at the tip are found to be comparable with those necessary for field emission. The highest fields are established on gold tips, consistent with the experiments of Green et al. who found the best responsivity occurs with gold-gold contacts. Finally we discuss the significance of the experimental results of Young et al. on metal-vacuum-metal tunneling characteristics to the MOM tunneling hypothesis.
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