Nonsaturating velocity-field characteristic of gallium arsenide experimentally determined from domain measurements

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Abstract
A new method is presented for the measurement of the average electron drift velocity as a function of the electric field (velocity‐field characteristic) for semiconductor materials which exhibit bulk negative differential conductance. The characteristic is determined from capacitive probe measurements made on high‐field Gunn‐effect domains. This method is most applicable for values of E > 20 kV/cm, where very little information exists. The method was applied to the measurement of the velocity‐field characteristic of GaAs. The characteristic found is nonsaturating and slowly decreasing up to 100 kV/cm, the maximum measured electric field. The results correlate well with the velocity‐field characteristic theoretically calculated by Heinle.