Analytical modeling and simulation of subthreshold characteristics of back-gated SSGOI and SSOI MOSFETs: A comparative study

The Silicon–Germanium-on-Insulator (SGOI) and Silicon-on-Insulator (SOI) based MOS structures are spearheading the strained-Si technology. The present work compares the subthreshold characteristics of two short-channel back-gated (BG) strained-Si-on-SGOI (SSGOI) and BG strained-Si-on-Insulator (SSOI) MOSFETs, and provides some solutions to overcome the degradation in subthreshold characteristics with the unrelenting downscaling of the devices. Subthreshold behaviors of the MOS structures are based on surface potential model which is determined by solving the 2D Poisson's equation with suitable boundary conditions by evanescent mode analysis for both of the MOS structures. The closed form expressions for threshold voltage, subthreshold current and subthreshold swing have been derived for symmetrical as well as independent gate operation (IGO). In addition, the Electrostatic integrity (EI) factors for SSOI and SSGOI MOS structures have been estimated and compared with Double-Gate (DG) MOSFET. The numerical simulation results, obtained by ATLAS?, a 2D device simulator from Silvaco, have been used to assess the validity of the models.     

Raman scattering in impurity-induced anharmonic crystals

The theory of first-, second-, and third-order Raman scattering is investigated for isotopically disordered anharmonic crystals. The theory of time-dependent thermodynamic Zubarev Green's functions is adopted to obtain the Raman tensor, intensity of Raman lines, and differential cross sections of various orders of scatterings. It is observed that each class of scattering can be separated into diagonal and nondiagonal parts. The first-order and nondiagonal parts are absent in the case of chemically pure crystals. The diagonal parts are separated into anharmonic and interference terms. The interference terms arise due to the interactions of anharmonic phonons with the local phonons. The temperature and defect dependencies are discussed in detail along with the nature of continuous and line spectra. It is proposed that very high-power laser sources will reveal the third-order spectra, and that the resulting structure can be explained with the help of temperature-dependent one-, two-, and three-phonon density of states.     

A microfocus X‐ray fluorescence beamline at Indus‐2 synchrotron radiation facility

A microfocus X‐ray fluorescence spectroscopy beamline (BL‐16) at the Indian synchrotron radiation facility Indus‐2 has been constructed with an experimental emphasis on environmental, archaeological, biomedical and material science applications involving heavy metal speciation and their localization. The beamline offers a combination of different analytical probes, e.g. X‐ray fluorescence mapping, X‐ray microspectroscopy and total‐external‐reflection fluorescence characterization. The beamline is installed on a bending‐magnet source with a working X‐ray energy range of 4–20 keV, enabling it to excite K‐edges of all elements from S to Nb and L‐edges from Ag to U. The optics of the beamline comprises of a double‐crystal monochromator with Si(111) symmetric and asymmetric crystals and a pair of Kirkpatrick–Baez focusing mirrors. This paper describes the performance of the beamline and its capabilities with examples of measured results.     

Directional couplers in trapped image guide configuration

Dispersion characteristics and wave impedance of trapped coupled image guides are computed by using mode matching techniques. Dispersion curves for trapped coupled image guide are plotted for various dielectric materials and dimensional parameters. The hybrid directional couplers in the above configuration have been theoretically designed by computing the normalization propagation constant.     

Modeling of transient electroluminescence overshoot in bilayer organic light-emitting diodes using rate equations

When a voltage pulse is applied under forward biased condition to a spin-coated bilayer organic light-emitting diode (OLED), then initially the electroluminescence (EL) intensity appearing after a delay time, increases with time and later on it attains a saturation value. At the end of the voltage pulse, the EL intensity decreases with time, attains a minimum intensity and then it again increases with time, attains a peak value and later on it decreases with time. For the OLEDs, in which the lifetime of trapped carriers is less than the decay time of the EL occurring prior to the onset of overshoot, the EL overshoot begins just after the end of voltage pulse. The overshoot in spin-coated bilayer OLEDs is caused by the presence of an interfacial layer of finite thickness between hole and electron transporting layers in which both transport molecules coexist, whereby the interfacial energy barrier impedes both hole and electron passage. When a voltage pulse is applied to a bilayer OLED, positive and negative space charges are established at the opposite faces of the interfacial layer. Subsequently, the charge recombination occurs with the incoming flux of injected carriers of opposite polarity. When the voltage is turned off, the interfacial charges recombine under the action of their mutual electric field. Thus, after switching off the external voltage the electrons stored in the interface next to the anode cell compartment experience an electric field directed from cathode to anode, and therefore, the electrons move towards the cathode, that is, towards the positive space charge, whereby electron–hole recombination gives rise to luminescence. The EL prior to onset of overshoot is caused by the movement of electrons in the electron transporting states, however, the EL in the overshoot region is caused by the movement of detrapped electrons. On the basis of the rate equations for the detrapping and recombination of charge carriers accumulated at the interface expressions are derived for the transient EL intensity I, time t_m and intensity I_m corresponding to the peak of EL overshoot, total EL intensity I_t and decay of the intensity of EL overshoot. In fact, the decay prior to the onset of EL overshoot is the decay of number of electrons moving in the electron transporting states. The ratio I_m/I_s decreases with increasing value of the applied pulse voltage because I_m increases linearly with the amplitude of applied voltage pulse and I_s increases nonlinearly and rapidly with the increasing amplitude of applied voltage pulse. The lifetime τ_t of electrons at the interface decreases with increasing temperature whereby the dependence of τ_t on temperature follows Arrhenius plot. This fact indicates that the detrapping involves thermally-assisted tunneling of electrons. Using the EL overshoot in bilayer OLEDs, the lifetime of the charge carriers at the interface, recombination time of charge carriers, decay time of the EL prior to onset of overshoot, and the time delay between the voltage pulse and onset time of the EL overshoot can be determined. The intense EL overshoot of nanosecond or shorter time duration may be useful in digital communication, and moreover, the EL overshoot gives important information about the processes involving injection, transport and recombination of charge carriers. The criteria for appearance of EL overshoot in bilayer OLEDs are explored. A good agreement is found between the theoretical and experimental results.     

Synthesis and characterization of β-Ga2O3 nanostructures grown on GaAs substrates

β-Ga₂O₃ nanostructures including nanowires, nanoribbons and nanosheets were synthesized via thermal annealing of gold coated GaAs substrates in N₂ ambient. GaAs substrates with different dopants were taken as the starting material to study the effect of doping on the growth and photoluminescence properties of β-Ga₂O₃ nanostructures. The nanostructures were investigated by Grazing Incident X-ray Diffraction, Scanning Electron Microscopy, Transmission Electron Microscopy, Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy, room temperature photoluminescence and optical absorbance. The selected area electron diffraction and High resolution-TEM observations suggest that both nanowires and nanobelts are single crystalline. Different growth directions were observed for nanowires and nanoribbons, indicating the different growth patterns of these nanostructures. The PL spectra of β-Ga₂O₃ nanostructures exhibit a strong UV-blue emission band centered at 410 nm, 415 nm and 450 nm for differently doped GaAs substrates respectively. A weak red luminescence peak at 710 nm was also observed in all the samples. The optical absorbance spectrum showed intense absorption features in the UV spectral region. The growth and luminescence mechanism in β-Ga₂O₃ nanostructures are also discussed.     

Nighttime enhancements in TEC near the crest of northern equatorial ionization anomaly during low solar activity period

Enhancement in nighttime total electron content (TEC) near the crest of equatorial ionization anomaly at Bhopal (Geog. 23.2°N, 77.4°E, and MLAT 14.2°N) has been studied for the solar minimum period March 2005- November 2006. TEC data recorded by GPS Ionospheric Scintillation and TEC Monitor (GISTM) GSV4004A receiver is used for the study and results are presented in the paper. More than 10% increase in TEC with respect to background content is considered for analysis. Out of total 138 enhancements, 65 observed during pre midnight hours and 73 during post midnight hours. It is observed that nighttime enhancement in TEC at Bhopal occurs in all seasons; it is more frequent during summer, less during equinox and least during winter months. The enhancement in nighttime TEC can be observed both in geomagnetic disturbed time and in quiet time. We found that mean peak amplitude for pre-midnight TEC enhancement are more in equinox and less in winter, while in post-midnight TEC enhancement it is highest in summer and less in winter. Post-midnight enhancements have smaller peak amplitude as compared to pre-midnight. Also the most probable values for pre- and post-midnights are 4.4 TECU and 2.17 TECU respectively. The percentage occurrence of nighttime TEC enhancement does not show any dependence on solar activity whereas the peak amplitude depends on solar activity. The percentage occurrence of nighttime TEC enhancement decreases as the magnetic activity increases whereas there is no such dependency found with peak amplitude. It is also observed that majority of nighttime TEC enhancements are occurred without scintillation. The localised nighttime TEC enhancements near the crest of equatorial ionization anomaly region have been observed most of the nights during the period of study.     

Resonance effects in the nonadiabatic nonlinear quantum dimer

In the presence of 1/f ^β noise, we investigate the logical stochastic resonance (LSR) in an asymmetric bistable model driven by various cycling combinations of two logic inputs. The probability of correct logic outputs is calculated according to true table of logic relationships. Two major results are presented. Firstly, it is shown that the LSR effect can be obtained by changing noise strength. Over entire range of noise variance, white noise can be considered to be better than 1/f noise or 1/f ² noise to obtain clean logic operation. At a smaller noise level, 1/f noise can realize higher output probability than white noise or 1/f ² noise. In the sense, 1/f noise can be considered to be better than white noise or 1/f ². On the other hand, the correct probability can evolves nonmonotonically as noise exponent β increases, and a kind of SR-like effect can be obtained as a result of β. At certain intermediate noise variance, the output probability is able to attain its minimum at β = 1. It is also shown that actually some finite β sometime can be better than β = 0 at small range of noise variance. The study might provide some potential complement to LSR effect in the presence of 1/f ^β noise.     

Constructing ‘hair’ for the three charge hole

It has been found that the states of the 2-charge extremal D1–D5 system are given by smooth geometries that have no singularity and no horizon individually, but a ‘horizon’ does arise after ‘coarse-graining’. To see how this concept extends to the 3-charge extremal system, we construct a perturbation on the D1–D5 geometry that carries one unit of momentum charge P. The perturbation is found to be regular everywhere and normalizable, so we conclude that at least this state of the 3-charge system behaves like the 2-charge states. The solution is constructed by matching (to several orders) solutions in the inner and outer regions of the geometry. We conjecture the general form of ‘hair’ expected for the 3-charge system, and the nature of the interior of black holes in general.