LUMINESCENCE AND CONDUCTIVITY INDUCED BY FIELD IONIZATION OF TRAPS

Abstract

When a photoconductor is illuminated at low temperatures, trapping states may be populated by electrons. If the light is then removed and an electric field is applied to the sample, these traps may be emptied by field ionization. For an electric field which increases linearly with time, the conductivity and the luminescent brightness display a sharp maximum at some field strength. It is shown that this maximum may be used to obtain the trap energy. The analysis of such field-ionization-induced maxima is very similar to the analysis of glow curves in thermoluminescence.