Experimental estimation of electron-hole pair creation energy in β -Ga2O3

Abstract

The applicability of using Electron Beam Induced Current (EBIC) measurements on Schottky barriers to obtain the mean electron-hole pair creation energy in β-Ga2O3 is reported. It is shown that, when combined with Monte Carlo simulation, this approach yields for Si, GaN, and 4H-SiC a data set consistent with empirical expressions proposed earlier in the literature for many different semiconductors. The method is then applied to β-Ga2O3, where complications related to hole trapping in the material give rise to a strong gain in EBIC and have to be carefully treated and taken into account. When this is done, the mean electron-hole pair energy formation is found to be 15.6 eV, in reasonable agreement with the values predicted by empirical expressions.