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Modelling surface effects in nano wire optoelectronic devices

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Abstract

Recent research on optoelectronic devices focuses on nano structuring which is expected to improve the performance and reduce the production costs of light emitting diodes for lighting purposes and solar cells, for instance. Structuring on the sub-micrometer scale increases the surface with respect to the active volume so that surface effects become crucial for the device performance. In this work we demonstrate the computational modelling of nano structured optoelectronic devices to complement the experiment. The implementation of the simulation model considers surface effects in these devices using a true area box method discretization. The derived surface models are applied on the self-consistent simulation of nano wire quantum disk light emitting diodes. By the computational study we demonstrate that the surface physical effects are critical for the performance of nano-structured optoelectronic devices and that surface recombination can lead to a low efficiency.

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Acknowledgements

This work is part of the European Commission Seventh Framework Programme project SMASH. Funding under the contract CP-IP 228999-2 is gratefully acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Computational Electronics and Photonics Group, Universität Kassel, Wilhelmshöher Allee 71, 34121, Kassel, Germany

    Friedhard Römer & Bernd Witzigmann

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  1. Friedhard Römer
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  2. Bernd Witzigmann
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Correspondence to Friedhard Römer.

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Römer, F., Witzigmann, B. Modelling surface effects in nano wire optoelectronic devices. J Comput Electron 11, 431–439 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10825-012-0424-9

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