Monte Carlo simulation of electron transport in wurtzite aluminum nitride

Abstract

We present the steady-state, velocity-field characteristics of wurtzite aluminum nitride, determined using an ensemble Monte Carlo approach. A three valley model for the conduction band is employed and ionized impurity, polar optical phonon, piezoelectric, deformation potential and intervalley scattering mechanisms are considered. We find that aluminum nitride exhibits peak and saturation drift velocities of 1.7 × 107 cm s−1 and 1.4 × 107 cm s−1, respectively, at a temperature of 300 K and a doping concentration of 1.0 × 1017 cm−3. The sensitivity of these steady-state results to variations in temperature and doping concentration is examined and is found to be much less than that of gallium arsenide. We also explore the sensitivity of our results to variations in the piezoelectric constant and demonstrate that piezoelectric scattering plays a significant role in determining the form of the wurtzite aluminum nitride velocity-field characteristic.