Photoemitter having a p-type semiconductive substrate overlaid with cesium and n-type cesium oxide layers

Abstract

Abstract A junction-type photoemitter is disclosed. The photoemitter includes a heavily doped P-type semiconductive substrate for absorbing photons of radiation to be converted into electrons to be emitted. An alkali metal layer such as cesium metal is formed over the substrate member for filling the surface energy states of the P-semiconductive substrate. Finally, a layer of cesium oxide is formed over the alkali metal layer to provide a low-work function surface facing the vacuum into which the electrons are emitted from the photoemitter. The substrate member may be made of a III-V compound semiconductor or an alloy of two different III-V compound semiconductors (each compound semiconductor including one element from the third group of Periodic Table and another element of the fifth group of the Periodic Table) to provide a semiconductive band-gap energy which is equal to or slightly more than the work function of the cesium oxide layer. The P-type semiconductive substrate member is heavily doped with a concentration of acceptor dopant greater than 3 X 1018 acceptors per cubic centimeter. Likewise, the cesium oxide layer is heavily doped with donor atoms of cesium to provide the relatively low-work function characteristic of such material. In a preferred embodiment, the P-semiconductive substrate is formed of InP or an alloy of InP and InAs. The photoemitter has improved conversion efficiency in the wavelength range from 0.5 microns to 1.37 microns wavelength.

Inventors

• 👤 Ronald L Bell

Bibliographic Details