Antimonide-based high-speed electronics: a transistor perspective

Antimony containing III-V compounds have long been considered to be promising for high-speed applications at millimeter wave frequencies. Part of their attractiveness comes from the flexibility in heterostructure design afforded by the addition of antimony to arsenic and/or phosphorus containing compounds. A central design feature of antimonide heterostructures is the presence of a staggered "type-II" band line up, and we consider the implications of this special lineup for InAs/AlSb quantum well HFETs, PnP AlSb/InAs/AlSb double heterojunction bipolar transistors (DHBTs), and InP/GaAsSb/InP NpN DHBTs. Whereas Sb- containing heterostructure devices have so far largely maintained the status of laboratory curiosity, recent developments in InP/GaAsSb DHBTs suggest they may break into commercial applications in the very near future.