Semiconductor materials with disorder: Materials issues and device implications

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Semiconductors are the active electronic materials present within electron devices. A great deal of progress in electronics has been achieved through a deep understanding of the material properties of the semiconductors used within such devices. Disorder is known to play an important role in shaping these properties. Amorphous semiconductors exhibit disorder in the underlying distribution of atoms, i.e., the atoms within these materials are not distributed in the ordered and periodic manner of their crystalline counterparts. Semiconductors that are grown as epitaxial films on non-lattice matched substrates, such as gallium nitride grown on sapphire, also exhibit a form of disorder, i.e., threading dislocation lines, which extend from the underlying substrate into the semiconductor material. These various forms of disorder impact upon the material properties of these semiconductors. Consequently, disorder has the potential to alter the performance of the electron devices that are fabricated using such semiconductors.