Direct Observation of Ballistic Transport in GaAs

Abstract

We present the first direct evidence of hot electrons traversing ballistically a thin GaAs layer. The energy distribution of the hot electrons associated with the momentum in the direction of the current was measured with the use of a tunneling-hot-electron-transfer amplifier as an electron spectrometer. The width of the ballistic peak was found to be about 60 meV for hot electrons with excess energy of some 300 meV above the thermal electrons. Those values are close to the expected initial injection values.