Chapter 3

Carrier Transport
Electrical current flow in semiconductors is mainly dominated by drift
and diffusion of electrons and holes. This chapter reviews the physical
mechanisms that affect the carrier transport in optoelectronic devices, including pn-junctions, thermionic emission at heterojunctions, and tunneling.
Simple formulas for the carrier mobility and for various carrier generation
and recombination mechanisms are given. Advanced transport models are
outlined at the end.

3.1 Drift and Diffusion

Semiconductor device simulation software most commonly uses the drift
diffusion model to compute the flow of electrons and holes. Drift current is
generated by an electric field F
and it is proportional to the conductivity of electrons n = qn n and holes p = qp p. Diffusion current is driven by the
concentration gradient of electrons n and holes p. It is proportional to the diffusion coefficient Dn and Dp , respectively. For uniform semiconductors, the total
current density of electrons and holes is written as
j
n = qn nF
+ qDn n
j
p = qp p F
qDp p.

(3.1)
(3.2)

We consider the elementary charge q to always be a positive number, so that the

current flows in the direction of the electric field while the electrons move in opposite direction. Both carriers diffuse downhill toward lower carrier concentration
while n and p point in the uphill direction.
Changes in the local carrier concentration in time must be accompanied by a
spatial change in current flow ( j
) and/or by the generation (rate G) or recombination (rate R) of electronhole pairs. This relation is expressed by the continuity
equations
n
= j
n q(R G)
t
p
q
= j
p q(R G).
t
q

49

(3.3)
(3.4)