Impurity states and electron transport in gapless semiconductors

Abstract

Abstract Specific features of transport phenomena in gapless semiconductors which are due to both peculiarities of the electron spectrum of an ideal crystal and those of the impurity states in these semiconductors, are discussed. A detailed critical analysis is made of a large number of experimental papers dealing with studies of the conductivity, Hall effect, and magnetoresistance in HgCdTe crystals as a function of temperature, pressure, and magnetic field. On the strength of this analysis it is concluded that the perturbing action of the potential of acceptor-type impurities leads to effective overlap of the valence band with the conduction band. As a result, when the impurity concentration is sufficiently high, and exceeds that at which the Mott-Anderson transition occurs, the density of states of a p-type zero-gap semiconductor differs substantially from that of an ideal crystal, and is similar to that of a semimetal.