TCAD Simulation of Multiple
Quantum Well Infrared Photodetector (QWIP)
Abstract
We demonstrate the capabilities of SILVACO TCAD tools
for the design and simulation of intersubband GaAs/Al-
GaAs multiple quantum well infrared photodetectors. We
compute the photoconductive gain spectrum of the de-
vice self consistently with the charge flow, non-radiative
capture-escape, and intersubband transitions in the ac-
tive region. The solid state calculations provide input to
a light propagation modeling tool that allows for multiple
reflections in the layered geometry of the active region.
From this full calculation, we extract light absorption and
quantum efficiency as a function of the angle of incidence
and the wavelength of a mono-spectral beam of light. This
TCAD simulation can be used as a starting point by de-
sign engineers for obtaining guide lines to analyze and
optimize quantum well infrared photodetectors.
Keywords: Intersubband transitions, QWIP, Capture-Escape, k.p,
TCAD, Zincblende (z.b), Superlattice
Introduction
The development of infrared photodetectors (IR) was
started after the Second World War, and it has since been
progressing at a rapid pace. Research in this field has al-
ready made important technological impact in thermal
imaging, night vision, and other IR applications. The
first and second generation IR detectors exploited the
intraband transitions, and were dominated by InSb and
HgCdTe (also referred to as MCT). Both these materials
could be used for detectors operating in the mid-wave-
length regime (MWIR), with wavelength in the range of
at 2-5 μm. The long-wavelength regime (LWIR) region
is accessible only to MCT via its tailorable energy band
gap over the range of 1–30 μm, large optical absorption
for high quantum efficiency, and favorable intrinsic re-
combination mechanisms. The MCT based IR technol-
ogy is often considered matured. However uniformity
and yield continue to be major limitations for MCT due
to a weak Hg-Te bond that results in bulk, surface and
interface instabilities. These limitations provide strong
motivation to search for alternatives to MCT.
Multiple quantum well infrared detectors (QWIP) based
on GaAs are an attractive alternative due to the well-de-
veloped growth and processing technology. They have
shown promising results, comparable with HgCdTe
photodiodes at low temperatures in LWIR and very long
wavelength regions (VLWIR). GaAs based QWIP tech-
nology also provides the flexibility of monolithic inte-
gration with GaAs electronics and into large focal plane
arrays.
The Simulation Standard Page 10 April, May, June 2013
The principle underlying the operation of a QWIP is that
of a quantum particle in a box. A set of quantum wells,
with geometry and composition chosen to support only
one bound state, collectively form a superlattice that
supports a quasi-continuum of extended states carrying
finite momentum. As a result, a bound state electron ex-
cited into an extended state by a photon generates a finite
photocurrent. Thus the bound to extended transitions
form the fundamental absorption mechanism that deter-
mines both the wavelength and the quantum efficiency
of the detector. Perhaps the most attractive feature of a
QWIP in this respect is the fact that absorption spectrum
can be tuned by quantum well thickness and the barrier
composition. On the other hand, the requirement of at
least 30-50 wells in a single device is still a limiting fac-
tor, which arises from the limited ability to control the
growth over such thicknesses.
Technology Computer Aided Design by SILVACO pro-
vides a flexible, cost-effective, and a rapid alternative for
research and design optimization of QWIP. It allows re-
searchers to gain insight into the complex physics inside
a QWIP, and provides the ability to predict the material
and geometrical parameters to create a device with the
desired operating characteristics. This results in a signif-
icantly more effective and efficient use of resources for
device fabrication.
Simulation Conditions
The structure of multiple quantum well we simulate
consists of three GaAs quantum wells (n-type doped
with concentration of 1.2×1018 cm-3), sandwiched between
the wide band gap AlxGa1-xAs (x=0.25) layers, which act as
barrier for the bound state carriers. The barriers should
ideally be intrinsic, but we model them more realistically
with n-type doping of 1011 cm-3. The thickness of quantum
well is 4 nm, which we determined by lowering the
thickness until only one bound state was supported. We
chose the thickness of the barriers to be 50 nm to mini-
mize the coupling of bound states in adjacent quantum
wells, thereby making the wells virtually independent
of each other. Inter-well coupling leads to inefficiencies
due to increased radiative and non-radiative tunneling,
and affects the spectrum in ways that are difficult to
control as a function of electrical conditions. The structure
of the active region and its electrostatic conditions may
be directly compared with the middle of the 50 well region
in the structure studied by Bethea et al [2].
Figure 1. Spatial profiles of conduction band edge and electron
quasi Fermi level for a QWIP biased at 0.15 V. The structure
consists of 3 GaAs quantum wells of thickness 4 nm separated
by Al0.25GaAs0.75.
To bias the active region, we include 100 nm thick GaAs
n-type contacts at the top and bottom of the active re-
gion, and doped to the same concentration as the wells.
The conduction band diagram with electron quasi-Fermi
are shown in the Figure 1. In Figure 2, we show the pro-
files of bound states acting as the initial states, and in
Figure 3 we show the profile of a typical traveling state
acting as the final state in optical absorption. The bound
states decay sufficiently rapidly in the barriers that the
well states can indeed be considered decoupled. In
Figure 3 we note that the extended states are character-
ized by highly oscillatory structure. Since the Schroding-
er equation solves (see below) for the entire profile, these
oscillations require a mesh with large spatial resolution.
We simulated 3 quantum wells instead of the full 50 well
device in [2] because the large oscillations of quantum
states require spatial resolution of less than 1 Angstrom,
such that the simulation domain becomes limited by the
Figure 2. Bound state wavefunctions in each of the three GaAs
quantum wells. The wells support only one bound state.
April, May, June 2013 Page 11 The Simulation Standard
Figure 3. The lowest travelling state wavefunction above the
top of the leftmost quantum well. Note the abrupt phase shifts
at well boundaries and the increasing oscillation frequency ap-
proaching towards the collector. Both these require a high spa-
tial resolution of the mesh.
CPU, memory, and simulation time. However, this does
not affect the conclusions reached in the simulation due
to the fact that the quantum wells are independent to
a very good approximation. Thus their optical response
is additive. An additional difference arises from the fact
that the quasi-continuum of extended states of the full
device is replaced by a discrete spectrum in the smaller
device modeled here. This is easily accounted for with a
physically reasonable yet sufficiently large broadening of
absorption line shape. Nonetheless, the users also have
the ability to model absorption into a 1D continuum with
its edge at the first extended state above each well.
We found from the simulation that the highly oscillatory
nature of the extended states results in a very slow conver-
gence of the magnitude of the optical transition matrix el-
ements with respect to spatial resolution. This only affects
the magnitude of the spectral response, while its shape
converges rapidly at much coarser mesh spacing. Thus the
meshes or nodes play a significant role for the accurate
estimation of the range of detectable wavelengths, as well
as the peak detection wavelength. The present simulation
also provides an accurate estimate of quantum efficiency
as a function of the incidence angle, taking into account
both the fact that intersubband transitions are driven
purely by TM modes (see below), as well as the effects of
multiple reflections at material interfaces. Depending on
the desired accuracy of magnitude of efficiency per well,
users may need to further refine the mesh, resulting in
longer simulation times.
The Schrodinger and Poisson equations may introduce
non-linear corrections as the active region is lengthened.
However, the electrostatic potential obtained from the
self consistent solution provides us with a measure to
gauge the importance of these corrections. This is so be-
cause the potential essentially determines the location
of energy levels and the wavefunction profiles, which in
turn completely determine the intersubband transitions
and absorption spectrum. From Figure 1 we note that the
quasi Fermi-level shows a linear drop of 0.15 V across the
active region, which translates to about 3 V across the 50
well counterpart of this active region. Thus the electro-
static potentials relative to the well depth, and thus the
Hamiltonians governing quantum states in each well,
are expected to be similar in both cases.
Calculation Methodology
The quantum well modeling, including its optical re-
sponse, is activated by specifying the QWELL model
for the quantum well regions. The model discretizes the
Schrödinger equation along the direction specified by
SP.GEOM, which in this case is along the length of the
active region. The discretized equation is solved via the
method of finite differences. The spatial dependence of
effective mass is taken into account via the current con-
servation boundary conditions.
The SLATT model activates the calculation of extended
states over the union of regions for which this model is
specified. This model also solves a discretized Schro-
dinger equation, but the solutions at each energy satisfy
boundary conditions of a plane wave of the same energy
escaping into the contact regions. The effective mass and
band edge parameters are derived from the multiband
k.p model. The bound wavefunction is assumed to van-
ish outside this range. Users have the option to set the
wave function penetration length in microns via the
WELL.MARGIN parameter. In the present case, the pen-
etration length into barriers is 0.01 μm.
The carriers in the states above the barrier band edge
comprise a current flow that is essentially 3D and semi-
classical in nature. The carriers from these states are
captured by bound states via phonon emission, and they
escape from these bound states via phonon absorption.
This in- and out-flow of carriers is included in the self
consistent drift-diffusion model for the entire device
by selecting the WELL.CAPT model, and is specified
by a phenomenological time constant (WELL.TAUN)
for carrier capture lifetime. This introduces an addi-
tional balance equation between the 3D semi-classical
and 2D quantum mechanical bound state densities. The
WELL.CAPT model modifies the conduction and va-
lance bands in the barrier region to avoid bound states
at edges. The resulting coupled drift-diffusion, Poisson,
and Schrödinger equations are all solved until self con-
sistency is reached amongst them at each bias point.
The QWELL model automatically searches for all bound
states, and includes in the optical response only up to a
maximum of WELL.CNBS many states of the conduction
subbands. If the number of bound states, say B, support-
ed (as dictated by the Hamiltonian) is less than WELL.
The Simulation Standard Page 12 April, May, June 2013
CNBS, then all B bound states are reported. In the pres-
ent case, we use this feature to verify that only one bound
state is supported by physical conditions of well thickness
and material affinities. We set WELL.CNBS=2, and then
verify below (see Results and Discussion) that only one
state is indeed reported. The users can adjust the barrier
height via the AFFINITY parameter on the MATERIAL
statement and also verify that more bound states appear
in the results as barrier heights increase.
The multiple quantum well structure is illuminated by
a black body source at room temperature. Planck’s for-
mula completely specifies the spectral distribution of a
black body in terms of the wavelength λ (in μm) and the
temperature T (in Kelvin). The absorption of this light
occurs via intersubband transitions from the bound to
extended states in each quantum well, and the presence
of WELL.CAPT parameter specifies this connection be-
tween the QWELL and SLATT models.
To calculate the spectrally resolved absorption of long
wavelength infrared radiation, the models consider the
electromagnetic field to be a plane wave of frequency
ω = 2πc/ λ. The coupling between the electronic states
and the electric field, E, is described by the interaction
Hamiltonian,
(1)
where dnm are the vectorial matrix elements of the dipole
operator between the electronic states n,m. In the present
simulation both n and m represent the different sub-
bands of the same conduction band, in other words, the
matrix elements dnm represent intersubband transitions.
When differences between the effective masses of the con-
duction bands in the wells and the barriers do not change
the wavefunctions significantly, the intersubband transi-
tions yield dnm = dnm s, where s is the direction normal to
the surface and dnm is the magnitude of the matrix element.
Since s.E yields the TM component of E, we obtain the fa-
miliar experimental fact that only the TM component of
the incident light contributes to intersubband transitions.
The steady state TM gain coefficient is extracted using the
Fermi Golden rule, and takes the form,
(2)
Note that the gain formula as reported in literature is dif-
ferent from the one in Eq. (2) in that the gain is expressed
in terms of the photon energy associated with incident
wave, instead of its frequency. Here, n r is the real part
of refractive index, and is the dipole matrix element be-
tween initial and final states, and in the direction perpen-
dicular to the plane of the quantum wells. is the density
of transverse states in two dimensions (a constant), and
Γ is the line width due to Lorentzian broadening arising
from the scattering of the electrons with lattice vibra-
tions, as well as collisions with interface roughness. Em,n
is the difference between energies En and Em of the initial
and final subbands of the same carrier type respectively.
f n and f m are the Fermi-Dirac distribution functions for
the initial and final intersubband states, and integrated
over the entire transverse energy range Et.
Equation (2) gives the number of photons with TM polar-
ization generated by inter-subband electronic transitions
per unit length. For a beam of light incident at an angle
with respect to the normal to the well, the dependence of
s.E on the incidence angle with the TM component of the
field yields the final gain coefficient, which is also input
to the optical propagation module, as
(3)
The factor of ½ in this formula arises from taking the beam
to be unpolarized [2]. The incidence angle specifies only the
plane of the electric field, and for a polarized beam for which
the angle of the field within this plane is φ, the inner product
|s.E|2=sin2(θ)cos2(φ). An unpolarized beam contains a uni-
form distribution of all φ, so that integrating the gain over all
cos2(φ) over 0 to 360 degrees produces the factor ½.
Results and Discussion
We begin with a discussion of the electronic transitions.
Figure 4 shows the TM gain for the device. Note that
absorption is simply the negative of the gain, and it is
clear from the figure that the device is absorptive over
the entire range of wavelengths shown. The spectral
bandwidth for absorption is approximately 2 μm, while
the peak absorption occurs at approximately 10 μm. The
spectral broadening in this calculation is 10 meV, and ab-
sorption above each well is limited to 5 traveling states
above the local barrier height.
Figure 4. TM gain versus wavelength. Note that negative gain
simply means positive abosroption of the same magnitude.
April, May, June 2013 Page 13 The Simulation Standard
Figure 5. Spectrally resolved radiative capture rate, which when
integrated over the shown energy range yields an effective time
constant of about 100 ps.
Due to thermal excitation, a very small fraction of car-
riers is expected to populate the extended states at 300
K, and contribute to dark current. The downward tran-
sitions from these states to the bound states are domi-
nated by phonons with a time constant WELL.TAUN = 1
ps. However, there is also very small contribution from
emission of photons representing the reverse process of
photocurrent generation. This radiative capture rate is
spectrally resolved in Figure 5 and its integral with re-
spect to energy yields a total radiative time constant of
100 ps. Thus we also confirm that, as is normal in QWIP
systems, the radiative capture is of negligible importance
compared to non-radiative capture emission included in
the self consistent model.
The absorption results can be clearly interpreted in terms
of the energies of the bound states, which in turn can be
directly related to quantum well widths and material
composition of barriers (in particular the barrier height).
We can thus tune the peak detection wavelength by sim-
ply adjusting the well width.
Figure 6. Total absorption as a function angle of incidence for
an unpolarized mono spectral beam of wavelength 10 µm. Note
that the ratio of photocurrents represents quantum efficiency.
The vertical axis is dimensionless.

Figure 7. Total absorption as a function wavelength at the inci-
dence angle of 30 degrees with respect to the normal. Note that
the ratio of photocurrents represents quantum efficiency. The
vertical axis is dimensionless.
We now show the results of total absorption of a mono
spectral beam of light incident on this device at various
angles and wavelengths. Figure 6 shows absorption and
the ratio of available to source photocurrent as a func-
tion of the angle of angle of incidence. The source pho-
tocurrent is the incident beam power converted to units
of electrical current, while the available photocurrent is
the photocurrent generated by absorption. Thus in the
absence of other loss mechanisms for IR photons, and
the generated electrons, the ratio simply reproduces the
absorption curve.
In Figure 6, the dependence of absorption on the angle of
incidence θ shows the characteristic sin 2(θ) form at small
angles. We note that the maximum lies around 70 de-
grees, and not at 90 degrees as would be expected from
sin2(θ) alone. As the angle of incidence increases the
beam propagates a greater distance along the surface,
and thus a lower fraction interacts with the wells before
being reflected back out of the device. The Luminous
module in Atlas properly accounts for all the reflections
to compute the actual angular dependence of the total
absorption, and it clearly shows the expected drop in ab-
sorption as compared sin2(θ) as incidence angles reach
60 degrees and beyond.
Figure 7 shows results of the calculation in which we
vary the wavelength of the mono spectral beam while
keeping its incidence angle at 30 degrees with respect to
the normal. Here, as expected, we see that the total ab-
sorption follows the gain curves since the intersubband
transitions are the only source optical loss in the spectral
range shown. The peak of the curve is again near 10 μm,
and the curve follows the gain curve of the well nearest
the optical source. Thus most of the total photocurrent is
generated from this well.
The Simulation Standard Page 14 April, May, June 2013
We have assumed that all the photons absorbed in the
quantum well excite the bound carriers and generate a
photo current. The internal quantum efficiency of quantum
well infrared detector can thus be computed by dividing
the Source Photo Current to the Available Photo Current.
In the present simulation, only 3 wells are considered,
and clearly, the maximum internal quantum efficiency
η for these wells is very low. However, as pointed out
above, addition of more wells would result in a linear
increase in absorption with respect to the number of
wells. This also explains why 50 or even more quantum
wells are required to obtain a practical detector, as also
reported in literature.
The spectral current responsivity of the quantum well
infrared detector is the figure of merit and may be cal-
culated from the gain and quantum efficiency data. The
spectral current responsivity of QWIP is
(4)
Here, λ is the wavelength, η is the quantum efficiency, h
is the Planck’s constant, c is the velocity of light, q is the
electron charge, and G is the photoelectric current gain.
The dark current characteristics of a QWIP is shown in
Figure 8 This can be performed by performing a series of
simulations with the same bias voltage scan but different
temperature specified on the models statement. The cur-
rent plotted on a logarithmic scale is computed for a large
bias range than in order to display its typical profile. Com-
parison f the dark current curves for the present device at
77 K and 300 K shows the temperature dependency. The
dark current is almost zero under zero bias condition, as
biasing increases the current varies linearly. The curves
clearly show the striking increase in dark current at high-
er temperature. This results from the much higher ther-
mal excitation at higher temperature. On the other hand,
the differential dependence on the voltage remains very
similar in both temperature regimes.
Figure 8. Dark current as a function of bias voltage at low and
high temperatures.
The sensitivity of dark current to temperature also re-
veals the further need for optimization with respect to
the bound states. One the one hand, single bound state is
necessary to ensure that all optical transitions generate
a current, which increases efficiency. On the other hand,
this also prevents us from having a deep bound state
from which the thermal excitation can be suppressed
even at high temperature. TCAD tools can be highly
useful in finding an optimal balance between efficiency,
detection wavelength, and dark current. Another prom-
ising application of these tools is to search for alternative
designs where these issues can be uncoupled and opti-
mized independently.
Finally, we comment on various simplifications made in
this simulation. We have neglected the effects tunneling
assisted excitation, which further modify the response
of the detector. The interface between the barriers and
wells is taken to be ideal, i.e. without any interfacial de-
fects or traps. The defect assisted tunneling is the major
noise source in QWIP at low temperatures. We have not
taken any noise into consideration in the above discus-
sion. Users can incorporate the different types of noise
associated with quantum wells using various noise
models in the SILVACO model library. Finally, the resis-
tance area product can be obtained by the differentiation
of the dark current density with respect to voltage.
April, May, June 2013 Page 15 The Simulation Standard
Conclusion
We demonstrated the use of SILVACO TCAD tools for
design and optimization of quantum well infrared pho-
todetectors based on GaAs in the long wavelength re-
gion. We performed room temperature infrared absorp-
tion, and dark current-voltage analysis. Although GaAs
based QWIP technology has undergone aggressive de-
velopment, improving the quantum efficiency remains a
continuing challenge for researchers in this field. TCAD
tools provide insight into the physical mechanisms plac-
ing fundamental limitations on efficiency, and the ability
to develop strategies to minimize their impact.
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