Photon-assisted breakdown, negative resistance, and switching in a quantum-well transistor laser

Data are presented on the transistor laser with collector bias and photon-assisted tunneling causing, under the constraints I_E+I _B+I_C=0 (α=ΔI_C/ΔI_E) and α → 1, breakdown and negative resistance effects in the IĆ-V_CE characteristics. Collector bias, aided by photon-assisted tunneling (Franz - Keldysh absorption), supplies holes to the n-p-n transistor base by tunneling escape of electrons (ΔI_B=0), "feeding" quantum-well recombination radiation (generation and regeneration, ΔI_E=ΔI_C=ΔI_hv) and yielding the negative resistance/switching condition α → 1 (α=ΔI_C/ΔI_E, ΔI_C =ΔI_E, ΔI_B=0, I_E+I _B+I_C=0), and, as a consequence, corners, negative resistance, switching, vertical collector current (ΔV_CE≈ 0), spectral change, and mode hopping effects in the I_C-V_CE characteristics.