Electric field gradient effects induced by an asymmetrically in-plane shaped GaAs/AlGaAs modulation-doped structures of various design are investigated within 4-300 K temperature range. It is demonstrated that current-voltage characteristics of such structures at low, 4-80 K, temperatures exhibit well-pronounced asymmetry arising due to a presence of two different gradients of the electric field in a two dimensional electron gas. This phenomenon is caused by both, different accumulation of two-dimensional electrons due to asymmetrical shape of the structure and nonlocality in the electron drift velocity. Experiments are illustrated by a phenomenological model and Monte Carlo simulation. Possible applications of the effect to detect electromagnetic radiation of GHz and THz frequencies are discussed as well.
@article{arxiv.0711.0474,
title = {Electric field gradient induced effects in GaAs/AlGaAs modulation-doped structures and high frequency sensing},
author = {D. Seliuta and A. Juozapavicius and V. Gruzinskis and S. Balakauskas and S. Asmontas and G. Valusis and W. -H. Chow and P. Steenson and P. Harrison and A. Lisauskas and H. G. Roskos and K. Koehler},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0711.0474},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
9 pages, 13 figures; version 2 -- greek letters in figures corrected