Characteristics of Schottky diodes with microcluster interface

Abstract

We present experimental evidence that a single Schottky diode on GaAs is an agglomorate of paralleled microjunctions with different barrier heights and saturation currents. The current-voltage characteristic of the cluster breaks up into sections of exponentials with different slopes as one cools the diode from 300 to 10 K. Noise measurements performed on cooled diodes at 4 GHz also confirm that a single device is a cluster of paralleled diodes.