Electron–LO-phonon scattering rates in semiconductor quantum wells

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Abstract
We calculate scattering rates for an electron interacting with polar optical phonons in a semiconductor quantum well based on a microscopic lattice-dynamics approach for the phonons. We employ an analytic approximation to lattice-dynamics results given by Huang and Zhu for quantum-well phonons. The resulting electron relaxation rates are compared with the rates obtained by employing ‘‘slab’’ and ‘‘guided’’ phonon modes which were used in previous studies. The intrasubband and intersubband electron relaxation rates are given as functions of quantum-well width, and the relative contributions of the confined and the interface modes are discussed for the three different phonon models.