Electrical and optical properties of the three-terminal double-heterostructure optoelectronic switch

A theory is developed for the three-terminal version of the double-heterojunction optoelectronic switch (DOES), in which the third terminal, the injector, makes ohmic contact to the active layer of the device. The injector permits the biasing of the active-layer-substrate junction, the effect of which is to reduce the threshold voltage at which switching from the electrical and optical OFF-state to the ON-state occurs. Reverse baising the junction initiates switching from the ON- to the OFF-state. The current and optical output as a function of voltage with the injector current as a parametric variable are plotted in terms of the physical and geometrical properties of the device