Introduction to thermo-photo-electronics

Abstract

Building the foundations of Thermo-Photo-Electronics became possible only after the correction of thermodynamic errors in the traditional theory of semiconductor Electronics and Photo-Electronics. It was these errors that determined the output of the asymptotics of the signal-to-noise ratio in semiconductor electronic devices, which led both to saturation of the limiting clock frequency of processors and to saturation of the efficiency of both thermoelectric and photoelectric converters. The paper shows that the energy band diagram of semiconductor contacts was built with a significant omission - without taking into account the temperature force on the contact. At the same time, because of the incorrect calculation of currents according to the outdated formulas of Richardson-Langmuir-Deshman, there were also PROHIBITIONS. The correction of the thermodynamic errors allowed to move away from the use of local, purely empirical patterns to the extended phenomenology of the description of processes in the Solid State and to the design of highly efficient Photo-Thermo-Electronics elements on this basis.