Threading dislocation lines and their impact on bulk cubic boron nitride’s low-field electron transport response

Abstract

Building upon Chilleri et al.’s [Solid State Commun. 352 (2022) 114776] relaxation-time approximation based low-field electron drift mobility formalism, we incorporate treatment of threading dislocation related scattering into this analytical framework. Then, for a reasonable range of threading dislocation line density selections, representative of boron nitride’s zinc-blende phase, the role that threading dislocation lines play in shaping the low-field electron transport response of this material is examined. The six scattering processes considered in this analysis include the ionized impurity, polar optical phonon, acoustic deformation potential, piezoelectric, inter-valley, and threading dislocation line related scattering processes. The impact of threading dislocations is assessed through evaluations of the scattering rates, the fractional scattering contributions, and the low-field electron drift mobility contributions associated with the various scattering processes. The dependence of the total low-field electron drift mobility on the threading dislocation line density is also examined. We conclude the analysis with a comparison with the results of experiment. Threading dislocation lines are found to be a significant contributor to bulk zinc-blende boron nitride’s low-field electron transport response.