Fundamentals of Semiconductors and Nanostructures

Abstract

The majority of experiments of inelastic light scattering on semiconductor nanostructures has been performed on III–V semiconductors, like GaAs, as the most prominent example. In this chapter, an introduction into the basic properties of these materials is given. The first section gives a summary of the crystal and electronic band structure of the bulk material. After a short survey into the properties of electrons in different dimensions in the second section, growth methods for so called vertical nanostructures, i.e., layered heterostructures consisting of two different materials, are described in the third section. In these vertical nanostructures, quasi two–dimensional (Q2D) electron systems can be realized. This section is finalized by the description of commonly used concepts for theoretical calculations of the ground state of such systems. The second last section introduces the most important methods for the preparation of lateral micro and nanostructures. In those structures, the dimensionality of charge carriers or of quasi particles is reduced further by lithography and etching processes, or by self–organized growth methods, resulting in quasi one–dimensional (Q1D) or quasi zero–dimensional (Q0D) quantum structures. The section is finalized by an overview over methods for the calculation of the electronic ground state of lateral nanostructures. Readers who are already familiar with semiconductors and the fabrication and physics of nanostructures may skip this tutorial chapter and directly continue with Chap. 3.