Hot electron phenomena in transport across metal-semiconductor structures

Abstract

Ballistic Electron Emission Microscopy (BEEM) is shown to be a versatile spectroscopic tool to investigate scattering phenomena of energetic electrons. Two examples are given for obtaining numerical values of scattering parameters. Thus the elastic and inelastic mean free paths are deduced from model fits to attenuation data for thin Pd films deposited on Si(111) and Si(100) substrates. In the second example, the quantum yield for electron-hole pair production through impact ionization of hot carriers injected into Si(111) is directly measured over an energy range from 1-7 eV.