Influence of radiative recombination on performance of p-i-n HOT long wavelength infrared HgCdTe photodiodes

An enhanced computer program has been applied to explain in detail the influence of different recombination mechanisms (Auger, radiative and Shockley-Read-Hall) on the performance of high operation temperature long wavelength infrared p-i-n HgCdTe heterojunction photodiodes. The computer program is based on a solution of the carrier transport equations, as well as the photon transport equations for semiconductor heterostructures. We distinguish photons in different energy ranges with unequal band gaps. As a result, both the distribution of thermal carrier generation and recombination rates and spatial photon density distribution in photodiode structures have been obtained. It is shown that photon recycling effect limits the influence of radiative recombination on the performance of small pixel HgCdTe photodiodes. In comparison with two previously published papers in Journal of Electronics Materials (Lee et al., DOI: 10.1007/s11664-016-4566-6 and Schuster et al., DOI: 10.1007/s11664-017-5736-x) our paper indicates an additional insight on ultimate performance of LWIR HOT HgCdTe arrays with pixel densities that are fully consistent with background- and diffraction-limited performance due to system optics.

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