Ballistic transport in II–VI semiconductor compounds and alloys

Realistic band structures are used in calculating the group velocity and scattering rates for electrons with injection energies up to 1 eV in ZnTe, CdTe, and the low-effective-mass alloy Hg0.7Cd0.3Te. Scattering from longitudinal optical phonos, ionized impurities, and alloy disorder have been included in our full band-structure calculation, which automatically includes both intra- and intervalley scattering. Of the II–VI materials considered, at 77 K HgCdTe is superior for low injection energies (up to 0.25 eV) while CdTe is superior at higher injection energies (1 eV) at room temperature. The attainable mean free paths ( ≥ 1000 Å) and group velocities ( ≥108 cm/s) for both systems are comparable to values found in III–V systems.