Band-gap engineering: From physics and materials to new semiconductor devices.

Band-gap engineering is a powerful technique to design new semiconductor materials and devices. Band diagrams with nearly arbitrary and continuous band-gap variations can be realized using heterojunctions and modern growth techniques such as molecular beam epitaxy. In this way the transport properties of electrons and holes can be independently and continuously tuned for a given application. A new generation of devices with unique capabilities is emerging from this approach, ranging from solid-state photomultipliers to resonant tunneling transistors.