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Strain distribution and band structure of InAs/GaAs quantum ring superlattice Vram Mughnetsyan * , Albert Kirakosyan Department of Solid State Physics, Yerevan State University, Alex Manoogian 1, 0025 Yerevan, Armenia article info Article history: Received 26 August 2017 Accepted 18 September 2017 Available online 21 September 2017 Keywords: Single quantum ring Quantum ring superlattice Elastic strain Band structure abstract The elastic strain distribution and the band structure of InAs/GaAs one-layer quantum ring superlattice with square symmetry has been considered in this work. The Green's function formalism based on the method of inclusions has been implied to calculate the compo- nents of the strain tensor, while the combination of Green's function method with the Fourier transformation to momentum space in Pikus-Bir Hamiltonian has been used for obtaining the miniband energy dispersion surfaces via the exact diagonalization proced- ure. The dependencies of the strain tensor components on spatial coordinates are compared with ones for single quantum ring and are in good agreement with previously obtained results for cylindrical quantum disks. It is shown that strain signicantly affects the miniband structure of the superlattice and has contribution to the degeneracy lifting effect due to heavy hole-light hole coupling. The demonstrated method is simple and provides reasonable results for comparatively small Hamiltonian matrix. The obtained results may be useful for further investigation and construction of novel devices based on quantum ring superlattices. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Semiconductor heterostructures containing zero-dimensional objects, quantum dots (QD) and quantum rings (QR) have a wide range of potential applications as new or improved active elements in a number of optoelectronic devices [1,2]. QRs are of particular interest due to their unique electronic, magnetic, and optical properties [3e6]. In most cases, these structures are fabricated with an intrinsic elastic strain eld arising from the lattice mismatch between the QD and matrix materials [7]. Knowledge of this strain eld is crucial for further device modeling since the strain substantially modies the band structure which, in turn, strongly affects the performance of optoelectronic devices [8,9]. Some experimental methods such as the deep-level transient microscopy and the photoluminescence measurements have been used for examine the conning po- tential and the carrier energy spectrum in InAs/GaAs QD systems. This studies demonstrate the existence of the energy barrier for carriers at the InAs/GaAs interface as predicted by theories [10,11]. Recently impressive progress has been made in the eld of manufacturing of ordered structures composed of two or three dimensional arrays of QRs [12]. For example, stacked layers of self-assembled InGaAs/GaAs quantum rings have been studied for laser applications by Suarez et al. [13]. Laterally ordered InGaAs QRs have been fabricated by a simple technique with combination of ordering quantum dots by strain engineering and dot-to-ring transformation by partially capping [14]. This * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (V. Mughnetsyan), [email protected] (A. Kirakosyan). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Superlattices and Microstructures journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/superlattices https://doi.org/10.1016/j.spmi.2017.09.041 0749-6036/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327

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Page 1: Superlattices and Microstructures · 2019. 1. 29. · Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327. technique has been showntobe capable of fabricatingthe largescale ordered

Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Superlattices and Microstructures

journal homepage: www.elsevier .com/locate/superlat t ices

Strain distribution and band structure of InAs/GaAs quantumring superlattice

Vram Mughnetsyan*, Albert KirakosyanDepartment of Solid State Physics, Yerevan State University, Alex Manoogian 1, 0025 Yerevan, Armenia

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 26 August 2017Accepted 18 September 2017Available online 21 September 2017

Keywords:Single quantum ringQuantum ring superlatticeElastic strainBand structure

* Corresponding author.E-mail addresses: [email protected] (V. Mughnetsya

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.spmi.2017.09.0410749-6036/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

a b s t r a c t

The elastic strain distribution and the band structure of InAs/GaAs one-layer quantum ringsuperlattice with square symmetry has been considered in this work. The Green's functionformalism based on the method of inclusions has been implied to calculate the compo-nents of the strain tensor, while the combination of Green's function method with theFourier transformation to momentum space in Pikus-Bir Hamiltonian has been used forobtaining the miniband energy dispersion surfaces via the exact diagonalization proced-ure. The dependencies of the strain tensor components on spatial coordinates arecompared with ones for single quantum ring and are in good agreement with previouslyobtained results for cylindrical quantum disks. It is shown that strain significantly affectsthe miniband structure of the superlattice and has contribution to the degeneracy liftingeffect due to heavy hole-light hole coupling. The demonstrated method is simple andprovides reasonable results for comparatively small Hamiltonian matrix. The obtainedresults may be useful for further investigation and construction of novel devices based onquantum ring superlattices.

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

Semiconductor heterostructures containing zero-dimensional objects, quantum dots (QD) and quantum rings (QR) have awide range of potential applications as new or improved active elements in a number of optoelectronic devices [1,2]. QRs areof particular interest due to their unique electronic, magnetic, and optical properties [3e6]. In most cases, these structures arefabricated with an intrinsic elastic strain field arising from the lattice mismatch between the QD and matrix materials [7].Knowledge of this strain field is crucial for further device modeling since the strain substantially modifies the band structurewhich, in turn, strongly affects the performance of optoelectronic devices [8,9]. Some experimental methods such as thedeep-level transient microscopy and the photoluminescence measurements have been used for examine the confining po-tential and the carrier energy spectrum in InAs/GaAs QD systems. This studies demonstrate the existence of the energy barrierfor carriers at the InAs/GaAs interface as predicted by theories [10,11].

Recently impressive progress has been made in the field of manufacturing of ordered structures composed of two or threedimensional arrays of QRs [12]. For example, stacked layers of self-assembled InGaAs/GaAs quantum rings have been studiedfor laser applications by Suarez et al. [13]. Laterally ordered InGaAs QRs have been fabricated by a simple technique withcombination of ordering quantum dots by strain engineering and dot-to-ring transformation by partially capping [14]. This

n), [email protected] (A. Kirakosyan).

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V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327 319

technique has been shown to be capable of fabricating the large scale ordered QR structures for many applications such as QRsolar cells and lasers.

In this work we have obtained theoretically the dependencies of the strain tensor components on spatial coordinates andthe miniband dispersions for electron and hole in a one-layer superlattice (SL) composed of InAs/GaAs QRs using the Green'sfunction technic based on the method of inclusions [15] in combination with the Fourier transformation of the Pikus-BirHamiltonian. The present work continues our previous study of interdiffusion and Rashba spin-orbit coupling effects onthe band structure of one-layer QR SL [16,17].

2. Strain distribution

Using the Green's function method suggested by Andreev et al. [9] an analytical expression can be obtained for the Fouriertransform of the strain tensor which has the following form for a single quantum ring (SQR) in materials of cubic symmetry:

~εsij

�x!�

¼ ε0

0BBB@dij �

ðC11 þ 2C12Þxixj.x2

1þ ðC12 þ C44ÞPp

x2p

C44x2þCanx

2p

� 12

"1

C44 þ Canx2i

.x2

þ 1

C44 þ Canx2j

.x2

#1CCCA~cQR

�x!�

; (1)

where

~cQR

�x!�

¼ 12p2 sin

�hxz2

�R2J1ðR2x⊥Þ � R1J1ðR1x⊥Þ

xzx⊥(2)

is the Fourier transform of the shape function of the QR [16,17] with inner and outer radii R1 and R2, respectively, and withheight h, J1ðxÞ is the first kind Bessel function of the first order, C11, C12, and C44 are the elastic moduli of the matrix (GaAs)material, Can ¼ C11 � C12 � 2C44 is the parameter of anisotropy, ε0 ¼ ðaGaAs � aInAsÞ=aInAs is the initial strain [18], aGaAs andaInAs are the lattice constants of GaAs and InAs respectively (see Table 1), x⊥ and xz are the components of the reciprocal spacevector perpendicular and parallel to the QR axis, respectively, i and j stand for Cartesian coordinates x, y and z. The summationin (1) is carried out by the Cartesian components of the reciprocal space vector.

The components of the strain tensor for SQR and one-layer QRSL can be expressed as follows:

εsijð r!Þ ¼

Z~εsij

�x!�

exp�i x!

r!�d x!; (3)

and

εijð r!Þ ¼ ð2pÞ2S0

Xx!

exp�ix⊥!

r!⊥

�Z~εsij

�x!�

expðixzzÞdxz; (4)

where S0 ¼ axay is the area of the SL unit cell. In Eq. (4) the linearity of the elastic problem is taken into account which allowsto express strain component for QRSL by the Fourier transform of the strain component for SQR. The hydrostatic and thebiaxial strains are defined as follows respectively:

εh ¼ εxx þ εyy þ εzz; (5)

and

Table 1The numerical values of the lattice constant (LC), conduction band effective mass (CBEM), band gap energy (BGE), conduction band deformationpotential (CBDP), valence band deformation potentials (VBDP), Lattinger effectivemass parameters (LEMP) and the Elastic moduli (EM) for GaAs andInAs materials used in calculations.

Parameter GaAs InAs

LC (nm) [19] 0.563 0.606CBEM (m0) [19,20] 0.067 0.026BGE (meV) [20,21] 1519 strained: 785, untrained: 418CBDP (meV) [22,23] ac ¼ 7170 e

VBDP (meV) [22,23] av ¼ �700; b ¼ �2000; d ¼ �5400 e

LEMP [18] g1 ¼ 6:98;g2 ¼ 2:06;g3 ¼ 2:93 g1 ¼ 20;g2 ¼ 8:5;g3 ¼ 9:2EM (1010Pa) [22] C11 ¼ 12:11, C12 ¼ 5:48, C44 ¼ 6:04 e

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V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327320

εb ¼ εzz � 12�εxx þ εyy

�: (6)

The numerical calculations of the strain tensor components are made for the following values of the structure geometricalparameters: h ¼ 2nm; R1 ¼ 3nm; R2 ¼ 10nm; ax ¼ ay ¼ 22nm, and the center of coordinates coincides with the center ofone of QRs. Thematerial parameter values which correspond to the numerical results in the present and the next two Sections(3 and 4) are presented in Table 1.

Fig. 1 shows the diagonal component of the strain tensor εzz as a function of coordinate in three different directions (100),(210) and (110). The solid, dashed and dash-dotted curves correspond to the three fixed values of z coordinate, while thedotted curve represents the strain component in a SQR at the plane z ¼ 0. First of all it can be seen that in the cases of z ¼ 0and z ¼ 0:5nm there are abrupt shifts in the strain at the inner and outer edges of the QR in contrast with the case ofz ¼ 1:2nm (the dash-dotted curve) because the plane z ¼ 1:2nm does not cross the QRs. It is obvious that in the case of SQRthe strain componentmerges to zero for enough large values of the coordinate. In the case of QRSL the curves are presented inthe region of the SL's unite cell. The lattice constant of the ring material: aInAs ¼ 0:606nm is larger than the lattice constant ofthe matrix material aGaAs ¼ 0:563nm. As a result the tensile strain increases when approaching to the ring's inner or outeredge from outside the QR. Inside the QR the initial strain decreases when the value of the coordinate approaches to the valuesof the inner or the outer radii. The negative (positive) value of the strain for z ¼ 1:2nm and for the values of the radial co-ordinate R1 < r<R2 is the consequence of the relaxation of the tensile (compressive) strain with going deep into the matrixmaterial in z direction from the QR surface. Eventually, in all three figures the curves which correspond to a SQR are lowerthan others due to the stronger influence of the matrix on the QR. Our results indicate to the coincidence of the strain dis-tribution for a SQR and QRSL when the superlattice constant is about 45nm.

In Fig. 2 the other diagonal component εxx is presented. The behaviors of the curves can be explained in a similar manner asin previous figure. However, in contrast to εzz, there is a qualitative difference between the dependencies in (110) and twoother directions. Namely the compressive strain in the ring region in (110) direction is larger than outside the ring due to thestronger influence of the matrix material in this direction.

In Fig. 3 the strain component εyy is presented. It is obvious that in the direction (110) the curves coincide with ones for εxxdue to the system symmetry (Fig. 3c). Comparing Fig. 3a, b and c one can conclude, that the tensile strain in the (100) directionfor r>R2 transfers to a compressive one in the (110) direction due to the material anisotropy.

The dependences of the hydrostatic strain on coordinate are presented in Fig. 4. It is well known that the hydrostatic straindescribes the relative change in the unite cell volume, so the different behaviors in different directions is only due to thematerial anisotropy. The small variations near the ring edges are probably due to the interplay between the effects of thematerial deformations in the xy plane and along the z axis. It is noteworthy that similar behavior of the hydrostatic strainwasobserved for quantum disks by Tadic et al. by using three different methods: the isotropic elasticity theory, anisotropiccontinuum model and atomistic calculations [22]. However the region of these oscillations is of the order of lattice constant,so this is probably the result of the continuous mechanical treatment of the problem.

In Fig. 5 the dependence of the biaxial strain on coordinate is presented, which is responsible for modification of thevalence band edge of the heavy and light holes (see Section 4).

It is clear from the symmetry of the system, that the shear strain component εxy ¼ 0 on the (100) direction, so only the(210) and (110) directions are presented in Fig. 6. Note, that the initial shear strain, without the influence of the stresses is zeroboth inside and outside the ring. So, as it is seen from Fig. 6b, the shear strain in (110) direction is positive inside the ring whileit is negative outside it.

The other non-diagonal element εxz is presented in Fig. 7. εxz is zero in z ¼ 0 plane due to the structure symmetry. Incontrast to other components there are no any abrupt changes in εxz strain at the edges of the QR. It means that the relaxationin the ring and the matrix materials with moving away from the ring edge occurs in the same rate because of approximatelythe same values of elastic parameters for both the materials. The dependences for QRSL and SQR in the ring region

Fig. 1. Dependence of the strain tensor component εzz on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions for three fixed values of z coordinate.

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Fig. 2. Dependence of the strain tensor component εxx on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions for three fixed values of z coordinate.

Fig. 3. Dependence of the strain tensor component εyy on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions for three fixed values of z coordinate.

V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327 321

(z¼ 0.5 nm) are almost coincide. Note that for all three directions there are points where the value of the shear strain changesits sign. These points coincide with the points in Fig. 1, where the derivative of εzz is zero.

3. Conduction band

Now, let us consider the influence of the strain on the conduction band edge and the electron energy dispersion in one-layer QRSL. We will assume that electrons make only two dimensional motion in the xy plane due to the very strong

Fig. 4. Dependence of the hydrostatic strain εh on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions for three fixed values of z coordinate.

Fig. 5. Dependence of the biaxial strain εb on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions for three fixed values of z coordinate.

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Fig. 6. Dependence of the strain tensor component εxy on the distance from the QR axis in two different directions for three fixed values of z coordinate.

Fig. 7. Dependence of the strain tensor component εxz on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions for two fixed values of z coordinate.

V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327322

quantization in z direction. This assumption corresponds to the case of QRs being sandwiched between to layers of insulator.The consideration of the motion in z direction will lead only to small quantitative corrections in the electron energy. It is wellknown that the confining potential profile Ec in the conduction band can be modified only due to hydrostatic strain:

DEc ¼ acðεh � εh0Þ; (7)

where εh0 is the ”initial” hydrostatic strain due to the lattice mismatch, ac is the hydrostatic deformation potential for theconduction band in GaAs (Table 1) [22e24].

Fig. 8 demonstrates the dependence of the potential profile on the distance from the ring center in three different di-rections both for QRSL (blue solid lines) and SQR (red dotted lines). The potential profile for unstrained structure is shown byblack dashed lines. We see that the depth of the confining potential decreases by about 60 meV due to strain. This effect ismore pronounced for SQR because of the stronger influence of the matrix material. One can also note the difference of be-haviors of Ec in different directions both for QRSL and SQR, which is due to the material anisotropy. The electron energyspectrum can be found from the Ben Daniel-Duke equation with following Hamiltonian:

Fig. 8. Dependence of the potential profile in conduction band on the distance from the QR axis in three different directions (100), (210) and (110) for values ofparameters R1 ¼ 3nm, R2 ¼ 10nm, ax ¼ ay ¼ a ¼ 22nm.

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V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327 323

H ¼ 12p

1mð r!Þ pþ Veð r!Þ; (8)

were

Veð r!Þ ¼ v0ð r!Þ þ DEcð r!Þ; (9)

v0ð r!Þ is the SL potential in the absence of strain, p is the momentum operator, mð r!Þ is the electron effective mass. Theperiodicity of the Hamiltonian (8) allows tomake the following Fourier transformations for the wave function j, the potential

profile Veð r!Þ and the reverse effective mass mð r!Þ�1 [17,24,25]:

jð r!Þ ¼ ei k!

r!Uð r!Þ ¼Xg!

ug!ei

�k!þ g!�

r!;

Veð r!Þ ¼Xg!

Vg!ei g

! r!;

1mð r!Þ ¼

Xg!

mg!ei g

! r!;

(10)

where g! is the reciprocal lattice vector, ug!, V

g! and mg! are the Fourier transforms of the Bloch function Uð r!Þ, confining

potential and the reciprocal effective mass respectively. Substituting (9) into (8) one can obtain the energy levels via exactdiagonalization procedure.

Fig. 9 demonstrates the dispersion surfaces of the first five minibands of unstrained (a) and strained (b) QRSL in the firstBrillouin zone. Comparison of Fig. 9a and b shows that the strain leads to the significant upshift and broadening of allminibands (about 40meV). It is worth to note that the energies at all points of each surface are double degenerated due to thestructure inversion symmetry. There are additional points of degeneracy, kx ¼ ky ¼ 0 and kx ¼ ±p=a; ky ¼ ±p=a for the secondand the third minibands in both cases of strained and unstrained structure.

Fig. 9. Electronic dispersions of the first five minibands of unstrained (a) and strained (b) QRSL in the first Brillouin zone for values of parameters R1 ¼ 3nm,R2 ¼ 10nm, ax ¼ ay ¼ a ¼ 22nm.

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V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327324

4. Valence band

To study the valence band structure we have implied the four-band Pikus-Bir Hamiltonian [18,26] which has a simple formfor two-dimensional motion:

H ¼

0BB@

�P � Q 0 �R 00 �P þ Q 0 �R

�Ry 0 �P þ Q 00 �Ry 0 �P � Q

1CCAþ Vh (11)

were

P ¼ Pk þ Pε; Q ¼ Qk þ Qε; R ¼ Rk þ Rε;

Pk ¼1

2m0

�pxg1px þ pyg1py

�;

Qk ¼1

2m0

�pxg2px þ pyg2py

�;

Rk ¼ffiffiffi3

p

2m0

��px þ ipy

�m23

�px þ ipy

���px � ipy

�g23

�px � ipy

��;

Pε ¼ avεh; Qε ¼ bεb; Rε ¼ffiffiffi3

p

2b�εxx � εyy

�� idεxy;

g23 ¼ 12ðg2 þ g3Þ; m23 ¼ �1

2ðg2 � g3Þ;

(12)

Vh is the potential due to the band offset, g1, g2 and g3 are the Lattinger effective mass parameters [27e29], av, b and d are thevalence band hydrostatic, biaxial and shear deformation potentials, respectively. Taking Pk ¼ Qk ¼ Rk ¼ 0 in the Hamiltonian(10) one can obtain an analytic expressions for heavy hole (HH) and light hole (LH) band edges [22]:

Ev ¼ Vh þ Pε ± sgnðQεÞffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiQ2

εþ RεRyε

q; (13)

where sign ”þ” corresponds to HH band edge and ”�” is for LH.

Fig. 10. HH and LH band edges in three different directions for two different cases of parameter values (a, b, c: R1 ¼ 3nm, R2 ¼ 10nm, a ¼ 22nm; d, e, f: R1 ¼ 2nm,R2 ¼ 5nm, a ¼ 15nm). Dotted lines in a, b and c correspond to single QR.

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Fig. 11. Hole energy dispersions of the first several minibands in the first Brillouin zone for values of parameters R1 ¼ 3nm, R2 ¼ 10nm, ax ¼ ay ¼ a ¼ 22nm(a,b,c) and R1 ¼ 2nm, R2 ¼ 5nm, ax ¼ ay ¼ a ¼ 15nm (d,e,f) without strain and HH-LH coupling (a,d), with strain but without HH-LH coupling (b,e) and withstrain and HH-LH coupling (c,f).

V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327 325

The band offset potential Vh ¼ 0:3ðEg;GaAs � Eg;InAsÞ [21] inside the QR and Vh ¼ 0 outside it. The corrections of the bandedge are considered due to the strain distribution with regard to GaAs matrix. That is why one should take the value of InAsband gab Eg;InAs ¼ 784:56meV when strain is taken into account and Eg;InAs ¼ 418meV when considering an unstrainedspecimen (Table 1).

Fig.10 shows the HH and the LH band edges in three different directions for different values of QR inner and outer radii andthe SL constant. The red dotted lines correspond to the case of SQR. It is obvious from the figure that strain dramaticallychanges the structure of the valence band and removes the HH-LH degeneracy. The HH band edge is shifted up and the LH oneis shifted down. Comparing Fig. 10a,b,c with Fig. 10d,e,f one can see that the separation of two bands is larger for the values ofparameters R1 ¼ 3nm;R2 ¼ 10nm; a ¼ 22nm due to the weaker influence of the matrix material. It is also clear that there is aslight difference between the curve behaviors in different directions which is comparatively pronounced near the QR edges.For large values of the distance from the QR axis the curves that correspond to SQR merge to zero, which is the valence bandedge for bulk GaAs.

Now, making the appropriate Fourier transformations for the Bloch functions for four eigenfunctions of Hamiltonian (10):j3=2;3=2⟩, j3=2;1=2⟩, j3=2;�1=2⟩ and j3=2;�3=2⟩, and for all parameters: g1, g2, g3, Vh and εij, one obtains a set of algebraicequations for the Fourier transforms of the Bloch functions. The hole miniband dispersions are obtained by means of diag-onalization procedure for the corresponding matrix in analogy with above mentioned case of conduction miniband.

Fig. 11 shows the hole dispersion surfaces for the first several minibands in the first Brillouin zone for values of parametersR1 ¼ 3nm; R2 ¼ 10nm; ax ¼ ay ¼ a ¼ 22nm (a,b,c) and R1 ¼ 2nm; R2 ¼ 5nm; ax ¼ ay ¼ a ¼ 15nm (d,e,f). Fig. 11a and d areobtained by neglecting the strain and the HH-LH coupling. Fig. 11b and e are obtained by taking into account the strain effectbut neglecting HH-LH coupling. And in Fig. 11c and f both the strain effect and the HH-LH coupling are taken into account.Note that all surfaces presented in Figs. a, b, d and e correspond to HH. As is seen from the figure there are considerable up-

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Fig. 12. Dependencies of the hole energies on the inner (a) and the outer (b) radii of the QR. The blue dotted lines and the red dotted lines show the corre-sponding dependencies for only HH and only LH respectively. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the webversion of this article.)

V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327326

shifts of minibands both due to strain and HH-LH coupling for SL with larger QRs (Fig. 11a, b, and c), while for SL with smallerQRs (Fig. 11d, e, and f) the up-shift is observed only due to coupling. The reason of such a behavior is the absence of enoughdeep HH energy levels in small QRs. The next effect that can be observed is widening of the shallow minibands due to strain(the forth and the fifth minibands in Fig. 11a and b and the second and the thirdminibands in Fig. 11d and e). This is the resultof tunneling strengthen due to the HH band edge up-shift in the barrier region (see Fig.10). The comparison of Fig.11b and c orFig. 11e and f shows that the degeneracy of the second and the third minibands at the points kx ¼ ky ¼ 0 and kx ¼ ±p=a; ky ¼±p=a is lifted due to HH-LH coupling. It is noteworthy that the strain has its contribution to this coupling due to the term Rε inthe Hamiltonian (10). The coupling effect is more significant for small QRs (Fig. 11 e and f) because of the closer minibands ofHH and LH.

Finally, in Fig. 12 we present the dependencies of the first five hole energies on the inner (Fig. 12a) and the outer (Fig. 12b)

radii of the QR at the center of the Brillouin first zone ( k!¼ 0). The blue dotted lines and the red dotted lines show the

corresponding dependencies for only HH and only LH respectively (by neglecting the HH-LH coupling and taking into accountonly the effect of strain on the confining potential profile). First of all we see that in spite of the decrease of HH energy(Fig. 12a, blue dotted lines) the total hole energy (Fig. 12a, black solid lines) starts to increase with the increase of R1 startingfrom the values R1 � 3:5� 4nm. The reason is the increase of the LH energy (Fig. 12a, red dotted lines) which effects on thebehavior of the total hole energy due to considerable HH-LH coupling in the mentioned region of the inner radius. Thedetailed examination shows that the bottoms of the HH and the LH band edges approximately coincide at this values of R1.The same phenomenon is lied beyond the initial decrease of some hole levels with the increase of the QR's outer radius(Fig.12b). Namely, the initial decrease of the energies of the fourth and the fifth levels is replaced by further increase for largervalues of R2.

5. Conclusion

Summarizing, a combination of Green's function method for anisotropic continuum model with the Fourier transform tomomentum space has been implied for calculation of strain distribution and the miniband structure of one layer QRSL. Theconduction miniband dispersions are obtained in the framework of Ben Daniel-Duke effective mass approximation while forvalenceminiband dispersions the four band Pikus-Bir Hamiltonian has been implied. The obtained dependencies of the straintensor components on spatial coordinates are in qualitative agreement with the results obtained by Tadic. et al. for quantumdisk structures. The comparison of the results obtained for QRSL and SQR indicates on more significant effect of the matrixmaterial on the strain distribution inside the SQR. Considerable differences between the dependencies of the hydrostaticstrain components on coordinate in (100), (210) and (110) directions are observed not only for QRSL but also for SQR becauseof the material anisotropy. It is shown that strain dramatically affects the band edges for electron, HH and LHwhich leads to asignificant modification of miniband surfaces in k-space. Namely, the deeper minibands are shifted up while the shallow onesarewiden. The lifting of the energy degeneracy at the points kx ¼ ky ¼ 0 and kx ¼ ±p=a; ky ¼ ±p=a is observed as well for holeminibands, taking into account the strain contribution. The dependencies of the hole energy at the first Brillouin zone on theinner and the outer radii of QR indicate on the regions for R1 and R2 when the HH-LH coupling is significantly large.

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V. Mughnetsyan, A. Kirakosyan / Superlattices and Microstructures 112 (2017) 318e327 327

We believe that this study will be helpful as a simple theoretical description of strain effect on the miniband structure ofQRSLs which are excellent candidates for fabrication of novel electro-optical devices such as intermediate band photovoltaicelements.

Acknowledgments

The research of V. Mughnetsyan was supported by the RA MES State Committee of Science (research project 15T-1C331)and the research of A. Kirakosyan was supported by the RA MES State Committee of Science (research project 15T-1C363).

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