Abstract: We study, by means of numerical simulation, the impact of doping and traps on the performance of the “solar blind” ultraviolet Schottky detector based on AlGaN. We implemented physical models and AlGaN material properties taken from the literature, or from the interpolation between the binary materials (GaN and AlN) weighted by the mole fractions. We found that doping and traps highly impact the spectral response of the device, and in particular a compromise in the doping concentration must be reached in order to optimize the spectral response of the detector. These results give us a powerful tool to quantitatively understand the impact of elaboration and processing conditions on photodetector characteristics, and thus identify the key issues for the development of the technology.

Key words: simulation, AlGaN, ultraviolet detector, spectral response