Optical vibration modes and electron–phonon interaction in ternary mixed crystals of polar semiconductors

Abstract

Optical vibrations of the lattice and the electron–phonon interaction in polar ternary mixed crystals are studied in the framework of the continuum model of Born and Huang and the random-element-isodisplacement model. A normal-coordinate system to describe the optical vibration in ternary mixed crystals is correctly adopted to derive a new Fröhlich-like Hamiltonian for the electron–phonon interaction including the unit-cell volume variation influence. The numerical results for the phonon modes, the electron–phonon coupling constants and the polaronic energies for several typical materials are obtained. It is verified that the nonlinearity of the electron–phonon coupling effects with the composition is essential and the unit-cell volume effects cannot be neglected for most ternary mixed crystals.