Modeling Hot-Phonon Effects in GaN Electron Devices

Semiconductor devices are fundamental components of modern electronics and as such, it is of significant interest the research in the complete understanding and simulation of carrier transport, which directly affects material performance. In advanced materials like Gallium Nitride or Gallium Arsenide, traditional assumptions of thermodynamic equilibrium for phonon occupation fail to capture realistic device behavior under high electric fields conditions. The non-equilibrium phonons, called Hot Phonons, significantly impact electrical performance like carrier velocity, mobility and thermal conductivity. This thesis work investigates the effects of hot phonons on electron transport in bulk GaN using models extracted directly by physics and a Monte Carlo approach to simulate the dynamics of charge carriers inside the crystal. The framework involves the analysis of the physical phenomena from a theoretical point of view, the extraction of the models from elementary relations, the numerical implementation in Python, the comparison of the results obtained by different models, the presentation of key results and future research directions.