NUSOD 04 TuAP

A FEM Approach to Simulate the Electronic Structure and

Optical Property of InAs/GaAs Self-Assembled Quantum Dot
Fu-Fa Lu, Tsung-Ting WO, and Chin-Hsing Kao
Graduate School of National Defense Science, Department of Applied Physics
Chung-Cheng Institute of Technology (CCIT), National Defense University
Tahsi, Taoyuan 335, Taiwan, R.O.C.
Self-assembled quantum dots (QDs) via strained epitaxial growth have received
much attention for applications such as nano-scale solid-state lasers and photodetectors.
The FEM based techniques are the most appropriate choosing for the engineering study
on electronic structure of QDs in practically. In this work, a new improved approach of
analyzing strain distributions, computing electronic structure by single-band effective-
mass approach [l] with FEM integrated is proposed. The main advantage of this
approach is its simple algorithm and fast computation. A window-based software
FEMLAB has been employed for multiphysics simulation in here. FEMLAB is a
general-purpose finite element (FE) solver that operates within MATLAB environment.
Figure 1 and 2 shows the contour maps of the strain components E a (%) of the top-
truncated pyramidal QD (PQD) and lens-sahped QD (LQD) distribute in XZ plane
respectively. The simulation outcome indicates that the dilation of QD along z-axis is
larger than the compressively intrinsic strain. Hence the combined action has lead to a
net tensile strain components E e (%) inside QD structures. Figure 3 and 4 gives the
isosurfaces of piezoelectric potential caused by shear strains in top-truncated and lens-
shaped QD structures. The piezoelectric potential exhibits only C, , symmetry. This
symmetry will alter the wave function distribution of carriers in QDs to some extent.
Figure 5 and 6 presents the strain-induced potential of electron and heavy-hole for lens-
shaped QD structure in XZ plane. In Fig. 7 and 8 the squared wave functions of
electrons and heavy holes at low-lying states in the QD are exhibited in 3D perspective
view. It can be found that the probability density of carriers exhibit spatial orientation
dependence. The low-lying energy levels of carriers with and without inclusion of the
piezoelectric potential are plotted in Fig. 9 and 10. The upper lines shows the confined
energy levels of electron; the lower lines shows the cases of heavy hole. Figure 11
shows the linear absorption spectra for the inter-band (i.e. valence band to conduction
band) transitions of top-truncated pyramidal QD with p-polarized incident light. The
main peak located at 1.12 eV from our simulation is close the result of Grundmann et al.
[I]. Figure 12 shows the linear absorption spectra for the inter-band transitions of lens-
shaped QD with s- and p-polarized incident light. This approach can be used as a
guideline for fast quantum-dot device structure design, especially in quantum dots laser,
quantum dot infrared photodetectors. Furthermore, the proposed approach and model
could be used to develop a three-dimensional nano-device simulator with further
specific device module.
[1] M. Grundmann et al., InAs/GaAs pyramidal quantum dots: Strain distribution,
optical phonons, and electronic structure, Phys. Rev. B, vol. 52, pp. 11969-1 1981,
1995.
I
0-7803-8530-6/04/$20.00 02004 IEEE 3
Acknowledgement: The authors thanks the Pitotech Co. Ltd. (Taiwan) provides a trial
license of FEMLAB 2.3. This work was funded by Chung-Shan Institute of Science &
Technology (CSIST) under Contract No.BV92G68P.
x k b m1
Fig. 1 : The contours of strain
components E E (%) of the
PQD in X Z plane.
Fig. 2: The contours of strain
component e E (%) of the LQD
in XZ plane.
Fig. 4: The isosurfaces of
piezoelectric potential of the
LQD in 3D view.
X*l u<r nl
Fig. 5: Strain-induced
potential of electron for
LQD in XZ plane.
Fig. 7: The squared wave
functions of electrons and
heavy holes at low-lying state
in the PQD in 3D view.
Fig. 8: The squared wave
functions of electrons and
Fig. 3: The isosurfaces of
piezoelectric potential of the
PQD in 3D new.
Fig. 6: Strain-induced potential
of heavy-hole for LQD in XZ
plane.
. . .
* k " d W, d l U "
Fig. 9: The low-lying energy
levels of camers with and
heavy holes at low-lying state
in the LQD in 3D view.
without inclusion of the
piezoelechic potential in PQD.
WO mm i t * IS0 I W MmIYIO 1m
I 1 1 1 1
*-Q.lrd- ImobuldTrarsinOm Ewrm ImiV)
Fig. I O: The low-lying energy
levels of carriers with and
without inclusion of the
viezoelectric potential in LOD. 2
Fig. 11: The calculated linear
absorption spectra for the
inter-band transitions of PQD.
Fig. 12: The calculated linear
absorption spectra for the
inter-band transitions of LQD.
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