Photoelectric Determination of the Image Force Dielectric Constant For Hot Electrons in Schottky Barriers

Abstract

Photoelectric measurements of the bias dependence of the potential energy barrier for electrons in gold n-type silicon Schottky diodes show that the image force dielectric constant deduced from direct measurement of the barrier lowering is 12.0±0.5, in close agreement with the infrared dielectric constant of silicion, and independent of the applied field for fields between 104 and 2×105 V/cm. The current-voltage characteristics of these diodes at room temperature cannot be explained on the basis of pure Schottky emission.