Heterostructure components : nanoelectronic and nanophotonic applications

Semiconductor heterostructures have become indispensable to the development of nanoelectronics and nanophotonics. This article provides an overview of these heterostructure components and the fields covered by their applications. Most recently, the use of high quality interfaces has achieved accuracy in the order of a half mono-layer. The selected examples fully demonstrate the importance of these extraordinary structures: heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBT), resonant interband tunneling, quantum cascade lasers (QCLs). The article concludes with a presentation of the multiple containment of two and three-dimensional heterostructures.