Nonequilibrium phonon spectroscopy: A new technique for studying intervalley scattering in semiconductors

Abstract

We present a new technique for studying intervalley scattering of hot carriers by phonons in direct-band-gap semiconductors. This technique utilizes the nonequilibrium optical-phonon population generated by the relaxation of photoexcited hot carriers as an internal probe of intervalley scattering of hot carriers. As an illustration of this technique the deformation potentials of intervalley electron-phonon interactions in GaAs have been deduced. Our results are in good agreement with values measured by other methods.