Introduction to physics and optical properties of semiconductors

Abstract

As the theoretical basis for the whole book, we introduce fundamental physics and optical properties of semiconductors in this chapter. We start the chapter by describing the electrons and their energy band structures in semiconductors based on quantum mechanics, then the electromagnetic field by the Maxwell’s equations. The focus of the chapter, and actually the central theme of the book, namely, the light-matter interaction, is studied in terms of first quantizing the electromagnetic field in terms of the number of photons and the energy carried per photon then calculating the optical transition of the electron between energy bands in semiconductors after either absorbing or emitting one photon. We also describe the phonon spectrum of the semiconductor which is responsible for many key features in the infrared spectra of the semiconductors.