Physical Analysis and Design of Resonant Plasma-Wave Transistors for Terahertz Emitters

Abstract

In this work, we performed physical analysis of resonant plasma-wave transistors (PWTs) for terahertz (THz) emitters. Through the analytical decomposition of plasma-waves into upstream and downstream focusing on the different phase velocity, we show that the reflection coefficient is over unity and newly introduce the PWT design window based on a simple 2-D plot, which can provide both the maximum channel length (L-max) and operation frequency. By our design window analysis, strained silicon channel with a momentum relaxation time of 50-160 fs (i.e., channel mobility 500-1500 cm(2)/Vs) show technology-compatible L-max as 12-40 nm with a tunable resonance frequency of 2-10 THz.