Streaming motion and population inversion of hot carriers in crossed electric and magnetic fields

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Abstract
In pure semiconductor crystals at low temperature very specific momentum distributions of hot carriers, including population inversion, are realized in crossed electric and magnetic fields, as a consequence of dominating optical phonon emission. Experimental evidence for the specific distribution functions is presented in a review of recent experimental achievements. The experiments cover Hall effect, cyclotron resonance and far-infrared emission work, made on p-Ge, silver halides and other materials. The possibility of far-infrared amplification is discussed. Polaron problem at high electric fields is pointed out. Also surveyed are theoretically predicted effects such as superradiance, cyclotron resonance amplification and carrier bunching in momentum space.