Design and simulation of GaN based Schottky betavoltaic nuclear micro-battery

Haisheng San; Shulin Yao; Xiang Wang; Zaijun Cheng; Xuyuan Chen

doi:10.1016/j.apradiso.2013.05.010

Design and simulation of GaN based Schottky betavoltaic nuclear micro-battery

Appl Radiat Isot. 2013 Oct:80:17-22. doi: 10.1016/j.apradiso.2013.05.010. Epub 2013 Jun 4.

Authors

Haisheng San¹, Shulin Yao, Xiang Wang, Zaijun Cheng, Xuyuan Chen

Affiliation

¹ Department of Physics, School of Physical and Mechanical & Electrical Engineering, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, People's Republic of China. sanhs@xmu.edu.cn

PMID: 23800650
DOI: 10.1016/j.apradiso.2013.05.010

Abstract

The current paper presents a theoretical analysis of Ni-63 nuclear micro-battery based on a wide-band gap semiconductor GaN thin-film covered with thin Ni/Au films to form Schottky barrier for carrier separation. The total energy deposition in GaN was calculated using Monte Carlo methods by taking into account the full beta spectral energy, which provided an optimal design on Schottky barrier width. The calculated results show that an 8 μm thick Schottky barrier can collect about 95% of the incident beta particle energy. Considering the actual limitations of current GaN growth technique, a Fe-doped compensation technique by MOCVD method can be used to realize the n-type GaN with a carrier concentration of 1×10(15) cm(-3), by which a GaN based Schottky betavoltaic micro-battery can achieve an energy conversion efficiency of 2.25% based on the theoretical calculations of semiconductor device physics.

Keywords: Betavoltaic nuclear micro-battery; GaN; Monte Carlo simulation; Ni-63; Schottky barrier.