Observation of negative differential resistance in GaAlAs single-barrier heterostructure at room temperature

Observation of experimental negative differential resistance at room temperature due to electron tunneling in a multiple-step single-barrier GaAlAs heterostructure is reported. Theoretical investigations of a three-step single-barrier heterostructure were conducted using the transfer matrix method and the Tsu-Esaki approach to obtain the transmission coefficients and current-voltage characteristic, respectively. The system was designed based on these calculations, and grown with molecular beam epitaxy. The diode exhibited negative differential resistance at 300 K and had a peak-to-valley current ratio above unity, which was in agreement with the predicted values. (C) 2004 American Institute of Physics.