PERGAMON Solid State Communications 113 (2000) 539542

www.elsevier.com/locate/ssc

Ultrafast electron drift velocity overshoot in 3CSiC

E.W.S. Caetano a,*, E.F. Bezerra a, V.N. Freire a, J.A.P. da Costa b, E.F. da Silva Jr c
a
Departamento de Fsica, Universidade Federal do Ceara, Caixa Postal 6030, Campus do Pici, 60455-760 Fortaleza, Ceara, Brazil
b
Departamento de Fsica Teorica e Experimental, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Caixa Postal 1641, 59072-970 Natal,
Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil
c
Departamento de Fsica, Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Cidade Universitaria, 50670-901 Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil
Received 22 July 1999; accepted 22 July 1999 by D. Van Dyck; received in final form by the Publisher 15 November 1999

Abstract
A theoretical study on the ultrafast high-field transport transient properties of electrons in 3CSiC is performed within a
parabolic and a nonparabolic band scheme. In both cases, the transient regime before the electron energy and drift velocity
attain their steady-state is shown to be shorter than 0.2 ps. When the applied electric field intensity is higher than 300 kV/cm, an
overshoot always occurs in the electron drift velocity, which is more pronounced when band nonparabolicity is considered.
q 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: A. Semiconductors; D. Electronic transport

Silicon carbide (SiC) carries a great potential for a new
generation of advanced devices due to its physical (e.g. high
stability, strong SiC chemical bonding, large thermal
conductivity, etc.) and electrical (e.g. high saturation
velocity, large breakdown fields, low leakage current, etc.)
properties. SiC may crystallize in either cubic or hexagonal
forms, presenting a large number of polytypes. 3C, 2H,
4H and 6HSiC are some of the silicon carbide polytypes,
each presenting characteristics that are particularly suitable
for high-power, high-temperature, high-frequency, radiation-
resistant, and light-emitting device applications. According
to ab initio calculations [14], the SiC polytypes have a
wide range of band gaps (1.272.10 eV) as well as carriers
effective masses due to the remarkable differences in their
band structures. The polytypes 3CSiC Eg 2:39 eV and
6HSiC Eg 2:86 eV have been extensively studied, in
part because they present the highest saturation velocities
under strong applied external electric fields, which suggests
potential applications for submicron high-speed devices in
the high-temperature domain.
Although the best crystal quality nowadays has been
attained with the 6HSiC polytype, consideration of
* Corresponding author. Fax: 155-85-2874138.
E-mail address: valder@fisica.ufc.br (E.W.S. Caetano).
0038-1098/00/$ - see front matter q 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S0038-109 8(99)00522-0
properties such as high mobility and high saturated drift
velocity, associated with further developments on the
growth processes, make 3CSiC of great potential for
developing high temperature and hazard safe electronic
devices. 6HSiC Eg 2:86 eV is very promising for
blue laser and light-emitting diode applications, but it has
the lowest mobility of the polytypes, which is a drawback in
several applications. In contrast, the high mobility and high
saturation drift velocity of 3CSiC makes it an important
candidate not only for high-speed electronics, but also for
high-temperature and high-power device developments up
to the submicron level. The improvement of the SiC growth
processes in the last years overcame several problems with
sample preparation [58], and has a key role in those
achievements.
For reduced size devices, and in particular for high-speed/
high-field switching applications, nonstationary physical
conditions are often imposed upon electron transport
mechanisms, which lead to the electron drift velocity and
energy time transients before steady-state transport con-
ditions are attained. To date, investigations of the SiC
high-field transport were restricted only to steady-state
phenomena, principally the electron saturated drift velocity
determination. Since the high-field electron transport
transient should be important due to possible conduction
540 E.W.S. Caetano et al. / Solid State Communications 113 (2000) 539542

electron transport in 4HSiC using a two-band model

with multiple minima, obtaining a 33% lower velocity
saturation in the c direction than that calculated by Joshi

)
ity (10 7cm /s
[12] considering a simple nonparabolic band. Tsukioka et
6 al. [13] have investigated the high-field steady-state trans-
port in 3CSiC within the single valley isotropic model and
4 have taken into account both parabolic and nonparabolic

D rift Veloc
9 bands. They showed that the steady-state electron drift
velocity has a gentle peak around 1:9 107 cm=s for a
E (1

6 2
field of 4 105 V=cm; and that nonparabolic effects are
0 k
2

3 0.20 responsible for decreasing the steady-state electron drift

V /c

0.15
0 0.10 velocity and energy. Monte Carlo simulations have been
0.05
m

s)
0.00 e (p the overwhelmingly preferred tool for these investigations
)

T im
[9,1113], although recently a hydrodynamic balance
equation method [10] has also been used. According to
these works, acoustic deformation potential, polar-optical
1.6
phonon, intervalley phonon, ionized-impurity and impact
ionization are the main scattering mechanisms determining
1.2
Energy (eV)

the steady-state high-field electron transport in the 4H,

6H, and 3CSiC polytypes.
0.8
To investigate the time evolution of the mean electron
0.4 drift velocity vt and energy et in 3CSiC, the following
9 two coupled Boltzmann-like transport equations are solved
6
E

numerically within the momentum and energy relaxation

(1

3 0.20
0.15
0
2

0.10 time approximation:

kV

0 0.05
(p s )
/c

0.00 dvt qE vt
T im e
m

2 ; 1
)

Fig. 1. Time evolution towards the steady-state of the mean drift
velocity (top) and energy (bottom) of electrons in 3CSiC calcu-
lated within the parabolic band scheme.
channel shrinkage in SiC devices, it is necessary to have
information on the ultrafast transport transient properties
of silicon carbides.
The purpose of this work is to present, for the first time, an
investigation of the ultrafast high-field transport behavior of
electrons in 3CSiC during the transient regime, both within
the parabolic and nonparabolic band scheme. It is shown
that the time for the electron drift velocity and energy to
arrive at their steady-state in 3CSiC under electric fields E
up to 1000 kV/cm is shorter than 0.2 ps. The band non-
parabolicity considerably enhances the electron velocity
overshoot occurring for E . 150 kV=cm:
In the domain of high-field transport in wide gap semi-
conductors, the pioneering work developed by Ferry [9]
(which dates back more than 20 years) presented a
theoretical investigation of the cubic SiC steady-state trans-
port properties based on the balance equation method. New
and interesting results on SiC-polytypes steady-state trans-
port properties followed only recently. Weng and Cui [10]
studied the high temperature hot electron steady-state trans-
port in 6H and 3CSiC, finding that the electron drift
velocities in both polytypes exhibit a gentle peak in the
electron drift velocityelectric field relation. Nilsson et al.
[11] have performed a simulation of the steady-state
dt mc tp e
det et 2 eL
qvtE 2 ; 2
dt te e
where eL 3kB TL =2 is the average electron thermal energy
at the lattice temperature TL; tp e and te e are the momen-
tum and energy relaxation times, respectively; kB is the
Boltzmann constant, q is the electric charge of the electron.
The numerical calculations are performed for electric
fields 0 , E , 1000 kV=cm taking into account both para-
bolic and nonparabolic SiC band structures, the latter
considering "2 k2 =2m e1 1 ae; where a 0:323 eV is
the nonparabolic coefficient, and m is the electron effective
mass [13]. As in Ref. [13], the electric field is assumed to be
applied in the k111l direction for the sake of disregarding
electron redistribution among equivalent valleys, and to
minimize the electron population in higher-lying subsidiary
minima. This approach allows the calculations to be
performed within a single equivalent isotropic valley picture
[13], in which the electron conduction mass m 0:313m0
(m0 is the free electron mass).
Instead of using expressions for the relaxation times, the
steady-state relations e E and v E as calculated by
Tsukioka et al. [13] allow one to obtain the momentum
and energy relaxation times, te e and tp e; respectively,
within the successful scheme pioneered by Shur [14], Roll-
and et al. [15], Carnez et al. [16], and Nougier et al. [17].
This scheme was used by Alencar et al. [18] to investigate
the high-field transport transient of minority carriers in
 E.W.S. Caetano et al. / Solid State Communications 113 (2000) 539542 541

smaller than 10 kV/cm [18]. On the other hand, it is only

twice as fast as the high-field transport transient of electrons
in bulk GaN zinc-blende and wurtzite subjected to electric

)
field intensities up to 100 kV/cm [22].

ity (10 7cm /s

6 For steady-state conditions (longer time scale) the results
shown in Figs. 1 and 2 reproduce very well those obtained
4 by Tsukioka et al. [13]. In the parabolic band scheme the

D rift Veloc
9 scattering mechanisms are not enough to saturate the mean
2 electron drift velocity (which increases monotonically when
E (1

6
the electric field becomes stronger) and to avoid a rapid
0 k

3
2

0.20 mean electron energy increase, as shown in Fig. 1. This

0.15
V/

0 0.10 behavior is due to a polar runaway [13], that becomes

cm )

0.05
0.00 s) effective in 3CSiC for electric fields E . 100 kV=cm:
e (p
T im
When nonparabolic band effects are taken into account,
polar runaway is not observed (see Fig. 2). The steady-
state mean electron drift velocity is stabilized, presenting
1.6
a maximum gentle peak around 400 kV/cm, after which it
decreases smoothly. The steady-state mean electron energy
Energy (eV)

1.2
obtained considering nonparabolic band effects does not
increase as much as that calculated within the parabolic
0.8
band scheme, which is due to the very effective role of the
0.4 isotropic intervalley phonon scattering mechanism in
9 dissipating the electron energy.
6
E

For a given electric field intensity and at a given instant,

(1

3 0.20
0
2

0.15 the mean electron drift velocity and energy are higher when
kV

0 0.10
0.05 calculated within the parabolic band scheme since impact
/c

0.00 (p s )
m

T im e
)

ionization and polar-optical scattering are less effective than

Fig. 2. Time evolution towards the steady-state of the mean drift
velocity (top) and energy (bottom) of electrons in 3CSiC calcu-
lated within the nonparabolic band scheme.
p-GaAs, and by Caetano et al. [19] to study high-magnetic-
field effects on the terahertz mobility of hot electrons in n-
type InSb. Recently, Foutz et al. [20] compared transient
electron transport results in wurtzite GaN, InN, and AlN
calculated with Monte Carlo and the energy-momentum
balance approach, finding a quite reasonable overall agree-
ment. The great advantage is that the solution approach used
in this work requires a shorter computation time in
comparison with the full Monte Carlo method. The acoustic-
deformation-potential, the polar-optical phonon, two
different equivalent-intervalley phonon, the ionized-
impurity and the impact ionization are the electron scatter-
ing channels used in the calculations.
The time evolution of both the mean drift velocity (top
panels) and mean energy (bottom panels) of electrons in
3CSiC subjected to electric field intensities up to
1000 kV/cm are presented in Figs. 1 and 2, the former
obtained within a parabolic band picture, while non-
parabolic band effects are considered to calculate the results
presented in the latter. One can observe in both figures that
vt and et attain their steady-state in less than 0.2 ps,
which is about 10 times faster than the high-field transport
transient of electrons in GaAs [16,17,21] and of minority
carriers in p-GaAs subjected to electric field intensities
isotropic intervalley phonon scattering, dominating the
relaxation rates of energy and momentum. In both the
parabolic and nonparabolic schemes it is shown, for the
first time to the knowledge of the authors, that the mean
electron drift velocity in 3CSiC can overshoot its steady-
state value when the applied electric field intensity is higher
than 150 kV/cm. The overshoot effect occurs at low fields
E , 300 kV=cm because the momentum relaxation rate of
the electron is larger than its energy relaxation rate [23,24].
The results presented in this paper suggest that the tran-
sient electron transport in wide band gap 3CSiC devices
can be as fast as in nitride compounds [20]. They indicate
also that steady-state relations can be retained during 3C
SiC device simulation for channels in the mm range. These
implications should stimulate the experimental confirmation
of the ultrafast high-field transport properties of electrons in
3CSiC, which is a formidable task. Finally, it is important
to highlight that the high-field transport description used in
this work requires shorter computation time in comparison
with the full Monte Carlo method, but the results should be
recognized, however, as very good approximations instead
of giving strictly accurate figures.
In conclusion, ultrafast high-field transport properties of
electrons in 3CSiC were studied considering a parabolic
and a nonparabolic band structure description. In both cases,
it was found that the transient regime for the mean electron
drift velocity and energy before attaining steady-state
values is shorter than 0.2 ps. An overshoot in the mean
electron drift velocity was observed for fields higher than
542 E.W.S. Caetano et al. / Solid State Communications 113 (2000) 539542
150 kV/cm, being enhanced when nonparabolic band effects
are taken into account. The overshoot is due to the fact that
the momentum relaxation rate of the electron is larger than
its energy relaxation rate. These results should stimulate
experimental research on ultrafast transport phenomena in
3CSiC.
Acknowledgements
E.A. Mendes and E.F. Bezerra received fellowships from
the Brazilian National Research Council (CNPq) at the
Physics Department of the Universidade Federal do Ceara
during the realization of this research. V.N.F. and E.F.S. Jr
would like to acknowledge the financial support received
during the development of this work from the Science
Funding Agencies of the Ceara and Pernambuco states in
Brazil (FUNCAP and FACEPE, respectively), the Brazilian
National Research Council (CNPq), and the Ministry of
Planning (FINEP) under contract PADCT/SDRI #
77.97.1120.00 3235/97.
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