Behavior of nitrogen impurities in III-V semiconductors

A detailed review on a few important issues related to the isoelectronic impurity nitrogen in III-V semiconductors GaP and GaAs ape given in this article. These issues include (1) the binding mechanism for the nitrogen bound exciton, (2) the electron binding energy calculation, (3) the exciton binding energy calculation, (4) the exciton-phonon coupling, and (5) the behavior of the nitrogen in dilute nitride alloys. We conclude that a key problem that remains not well answered is the interplay of the short-range impurity potential originated from the atomic energy difference, the strain field caused by the lattice relaxation and the accompanying electronic polarization. The solution to this problem is essential to solve the long-standing mystery: what exactly are those pair's configurations? (C) 2000 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.