Variation of Saturated Drift Velocity of Electrons in Silicon with Temperature

Abstract

Recently, the author has shown conservation of energy and momentum of free electrons in materials at room temperature undergoing drift, with examples of Si and GaAs.  In the present study, the variation of the saturated drift velocity of electrons with temperature is illustrated taking the example of the Silicon material.   It is shown that while the free electron energy at room temperature remains constant due to conservation of energy, the saturated drift velocity increases with decreasing temperature as the electron effective mass reduces upon application of the universal mass-energy equivalence relation dE/E = dm/m.  The observed total electron kinetic energies are calculated during drift at high fields at different temperatures.  Gain or loss of energies at different temperatures due to changes in electron collisions with the lattice atoms and electron trappings in defects are further calculated.  The quantitative analysis due to the now available universal mass-energy equivalence relation is one of the main contributions of this research paper.